
Oass. 



C" 



-W^H. 



Book ^^Ba^ILSL 



ADDRESSES 



DEATH OF HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 



DELIVERED IiV THE 



SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 



ON 



WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 11, 1861. 



WASHINGTON : 

OOVKKNMENT PKINTINa OFFICE. 

1862. 



IB- 



ADDRESSES 



^f 



DEATH OF HON. EDWARD D. BAKER, 



DELIVEaED IN THE 



SENATE AND HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 



OK 




WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 11, 1861. 



< 



m- 



WASHINGTON : 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 

1862. 



■01 



0- 



IN THE HOUSE OP REPRESENTATIVES, 

Friday, January 24, 1862. 

Resolved, That ten thousand copies of the Eulogies delivered on 
the occasion of the announcement of the death of Hon. Edward 
D. Baker, Senator from Oregon, be printed for the use of the 
House. 

Attest: 

EM. ETHERIDGK, 

CUrTi. 



n- 



ni) 



©■ 



■^ 



ADDRESSES 



DEATH OF HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 



IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES. 

Wednesday, December 11, 1861. 



DEATH OP HON. EDWAED D. BAKER. 

The President of the United States entered the Senate Chamber, 
supported by Hon. Lyman Trumbull and Hon. 0. H. Browning, 
Senators from the State of Illinois. He was introduced to the Vice 
President, and took a seat beside him on the dais appropriated to the 
President of the Senate. J. Gr. Nicolay, Esq., and John Hay, Esq., 
Private Secretaries to the President of the United States, took seats 
near the central entrance. 



Address of Mr. Nesmith, of Oregon. 

Mr. Peesident; The usage of tliis body imposes 
upon me the melancholy duty of announcing the death 
of my late colleague, Edward Dickinson Baker, United 
States Senator from the State of Oregon, who fell 
gloriously fighting under our national flag, at the head of 
his command, near Leesburg, in Virginia, on the 21st 
day of last October. Mr. Baker was a native of Eng- 
land. While young his family emigrated to Philadelphia, 



-m 



m; ^ 

4 OBITUARY ADDRESSES 

where he resided with them for several years, and sub- 
sequently emigrated to the State of Illinois. He early 
embraced the profession of the law, and became eminent 
as an advocate at the bar, composed of the ablest law- 
yers in the West, many of whom have since achieved 
honorable distinction in other pursuits. 

Mr. Baker was twice chosen a Representative to 
Congress from Illinois, and at the commencement of 
the war with Mexico was selected to command a regi- 
ment of his constituents. He served with distinction 
at the battle of Cerro Gordo, and assumed the connnand 
of his brigade after the fall of General Shields. In 
1852 he went to California, and by his commanding 
ability soon secured a fine legal practice, which he 
retained until he changed his residence to Oregon. As 
an orator, Mr. Baker ranked high, and was peculiarly 
fliscinating in his manner and diction ; as a soldier, he 
was possessed of a rare aptitude for the profession of 
arms, combined with that cool, unflinching courage 
which enabled him to perform the most arduous duties 
under trying circumstances, and to look upon the most 
fearful peril with composure. We all recollect how, 
during the late session of Congress, he threw his influ- 
ence on the side of his country ; and when responding 
to what he denominated the " polished treason " of a 
Senator upon this floor, he declared himself in favor of 
" bold, sudden, forward, and determined war." What 
he said as a senator he was willing to do as a soldier. 

It is but a few short months since, in the presence of 
this body, he took upon himself a solemn oath to sup- 
port the Constitution of the United States ; that cove- 
nant has been sealed with his heart's blood. Death has 



-3 



m ^ 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 5 



silenced his eloquence forever ; and his manly form has 
been consigned to its last resting place on the shores of 
the distant Pacific. 

In the glowing eloquence of his own words, as he 
stood by the grave of his friend Broderick, " the last 
words must be spoken, and the imperious mandate of 
Death must be fulfilled. Thus, brave heart, we bear 
thee to thy rest. Thus, surrounded by tens of thou- 
sands, we leave thee to the equal grave. As in life no 
other voice among us so rang its trumpet blast upon the 
ear of freemen, so in death its echoes will reverl^erate 
amidst our mountains and our valleys until truth and 
valor cease to appeal to the human heart." 

Mr. President, I shall leave to others more competent 
than myself to do justice to the character and many 
virtues of my colleague ; and 

"No further seek his merits to disclose, 
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode; 
There they alike in trembling hope repose, 
The bosom of his Father and his God." 

I offer the following resolutions: 

Resolved, That the members of the Senate, from a sincere desire 
of showing every mark of respect due to the memory of Hon. 
Edward D. Baker, deceased, late a Senator from the State of 
Oregon, will go into mourning by wearing crape on the left arm for 
thirty days. 

Resoh-cd, That, as an additional mark of respect for the memory 
of Hon. Edward D. Baker, the Senate do now adjourn. 

Ordered, That the Secretary communicate these resolutions to 
the House of Representatives. 



m- 



Address of Mr. McDougall, of CaUfornia. 

Mr. President: Within the brief period I have 
occupied a seat on this floor, I have hstened to the 
formal announcement of the decease of the two Sena- 
tors nearest to me by the ties of association and friend- 
ship, both representative men, and among the ablest 
that ever discoursed counsel in this Senate. 

I trust I shall be pardoned if it be thought that there 
is something of pride in my claim of friendship with 
such distinguished and not to be forgotten men. 

The late Senator from Illinois, as well as the late 
Senator of whom I am about to speak, were my seniors 
in years, and much more largely instructed than myself 
in public affairs. Differing as they had for a period of 
more than a quarter of a century, they had met together, 
and in the maintenance, in all its integrity, of the great 
governmental institution of our fathers, they were one. 
Coming myself a stranger to your counsels, I looked to 
them for that home advice in which there is no purpose 
of disguise or concealment. 

Their loss has been, and is, to me, like the shadows of 
great clouds ; but while I have felt, and now feel, their 
loss, as companions, friends, and counselors, in whose 
truth I trusted, I feel that no sense of private loss should 
find expression when a nation suflfers. I may say here, 
however, that while for the loss of these two great Sen- 
ators a nation suffers, the far country from whence I 
come feels the sufferings of a double loss. They were 
both soldiers and champions of the West — of our new 
and undeveloped possessions. A few months since the 



g 

IIOX. EDWARD D. BAKER. 7 

people of the Pacific, from the Sea of Cortez to the 
Straits of Fuca, mourned for Douglas : the same people 
now mourn for Baker. The two Senators were widely 
different men, molded in widely different forms, and 
they walked in widely different paths ; but the tread of 
their hearts kept time, and they each sought a common 
goal, only by different paths. 

The record of the honorable birth, brilliant life, and 
heroic death of the late Edward Dickinson Baker 
has been already made by a thousand eloquent pens. 
That record has deen read in cabin and in hall from 
Maine to furthest Oregon. I offer now but to pay to 
his memory the tribute of my love and praise. While 
paying this tribute wdth a proud sadness, I trust its 
value will not be diminished when I state that for many 
years, and until the recent demands of patriotism ex- 
tinguished controversial differences, we were almost 
constant adversaries in the forum and at the bar. 

A great writer, in undertaking to describe one of the 
greatest of men, said : " Know that there is not one of 
you wdio is aware of his real nature." I think that, 
with all due respect, I might say of the late Senator 
the same thing to this Senate, as I am compelled to say 
it to myself Of all the men I have ever known, he 
was the most difficult to comprehend. 

He was a many-sided man. Will, mind, power radi- 
ated from one centre within him, in all directions ; and 
while the making of that circle, wdiich, according to the 
dreams of old philosophy, would constitute a perfect 
being, is not within human hope, he may be regarded as 
one who at least illustrated the thought. 

His great powers cannot be attributed to the work 



of laborious years. They were not his achievements. 
They were gifts, God-given. His sensations, memory, 
thought, and action w^ent hand in hand together, with a 
velocity and power which, if not always exciting admi- 
ration, compelled astonishment. 

Although learned, the late Senator was not what is 
called a scholar. He was too full of stirring life to 
labor among the moldy records of dead ages ; and had 
he not been, the wilderness of the West furnished no 
field for the exercise of mere scholarly accomplishments, 

I say the late Senator was learned. He was skilled 
in metaphysics, logic, and law. He might be called a 
master of history, and of all the literature of our own 
language. He knew much of music — not only music 
as it gives present pleasure to the ear, but music in the 
sense in which it was understood by the old seekers 
after wisdom, who held that in harmonious sounds rested 
some of the great secrets of the infinite. 

Poetry he inhaled and expressed. The afflatus called 
divine breathed about him. Many years since, on the 
then wild plains of the West, in the middle of a star-lit 
night, as we journeyed together, I heard first from him 
the chant of that noble song, "The Battle of Ivry." 
Two of its stanzas impressed me then, and there are 
other reasons why they impress me now: 

" The King has come to marshal us, in all his armor dressed ; 
And he has bound a snow-Avhite plume upon his gallant crest. 
He looked upon his people, and a tear was in his eye ; 
lie looked upon the traitors, and his glance was stern and high : 
Right graciously he smiled on us, as ran from wing to wing, 
Down all our line, a deafening shout, ' God save our Lord the King !' 
And if my standard-bearer fall, and fall full well he may, 
For never saw I promise yet of such a bloody fray, 



-m 



p- 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 



Press where ye see my white plume shines, amidst the ranks of war ; 
And be your oriflamme to-day, the helmet of Navarre. 

Hurrah ! the foes are moving — hark to the mingled din 

Of fife and steed, and trump and drum, and roaring culverin ; 

The fiery Duke is pricking fast across St. Andre's plain, 

With all the hireling chivalry of Gueldres and Almagne. 

'Now, by the lips of those ye love, fair gentlemen of France, 

Charge! for the golden lilies — now upon them Avith the lance !' 

A thousand spurs are striking deep, a thousand spears in rest, 

A thousand knights are pressing close behind the snow-white crest ; 

And in they burst, and on they rashed ! while, like a guiding star. 

Amidst the thickest carnage blazed the helmet of Navarre." 

It was the poetry which embodies the hfe of great 
and chivah-ous action which moved him most, and he 
possessed the power to create it. 

He was an orator. Not an orator trained to the 
model of the Greek or Roman school, but one far better 
suited to our age and people. He was a master of 
dialectics, and possessed a skill and power in words 
which would have confounded the rhetoric of Gorgias, 
and demanded of the great master of dialectics himself 
the exact use of all his materials of wordy warfare. 

He was deeply versed in all that belongs to the 
relations and conduct of all forms of societies, from 
families to States, and the laws which have and do 
govern them. 

He was not a man of authorities simply, because he 
used authorities only as the rounds whereby to ascend 
to principles. 

Having learned much, he was a remarkable master 
of all he knew, whether, it was to analyse, generalise, 
or combine his vast materials. 

It was true of him, as it is true of most remarkable 



p p 

10 OBITUARY ADDRESSES- 

minds, tliat he did not always appear to be all lie was. 
The occasion made the measure of the exhibition of 
his strength. When the occasion challenged the effort, 
he could discourse as cunningly as the Sage of Ithaca, 
and as wisely as the King of Pylus. 

He was a soldier. He was a leader — "a man of 
war" — fit, like the Tachmonite, "to sit in the seat, 
chief among the caj^tains." Like all men who possess 
hero blood, he loved tame, glory, honorable renown. 
He thirsted for it with an ardent thirst, as did Cicero 
and Caesar; and what was that nectar in which the 
gods delighted on high Olympus but the wine of praise 
for great deeds accomplished 1 AVould that he might 
have lived, so that his great sacrifice might have been 
offered, and his great soul have gone up, from some 
great victorious field, his lips bathed with the nectar 
that he loved. 

None ever felt more than he — 

" Since all must life resign, 

Those sweet delights that decorate the brave 
'Tis folly to decline, 
And steal inglorious to the silent grave." 

But it was something more than the fierce thirst for 
glory that carried the late Senator to the field of sacrifice. 
No one felt more than he the majestic dignity of the great 
cause for which our nation now makes war. He loved 
freedom — if you please, Anglo-Saxon freedom ; for he 
was of that great old race. He loved this land — this 
whole land. He had done much to conquer it from the 
wilderness ; and by his own acts he had made it his 
land. 

Hero blood is patriotic blood. When he witnessed 



the storm of anarchy with which the madness of de- 
praved ambition sought to overwhehn the land of his 
choice and love — when he heard the battle call — 

"Lay down the ax, fling by the spade, 

Leave in its track tbe toiling plow; 
The rifle and the bayonet blade, 

For arms like yours, are fitter now. 
And let the hands that ply the pen, 

Quit the light task, and learn to wield 
The horseman's crooked brand, and rein 

The charger on the battle-field. 

"Our country calls — away! away! 

To where the blood-streams blot the green! 
Strike to defend the gentlest sway 
That time in all its course has seen ! " — 

it was in the spirit of the patriot hero that the gallant 
soldier, the grave Senator, the white-haired man of 
counsel, yet full of youth as full of years, gave answer, 
as does the war-horse, to the trumpet's sound. 

The wisdom of his conduct has been questioned. 
Many have thought that he should have remained for 
counsel in this hall. Mr. President, the propriety of a 
Senator taking upon himself the duties of a soldier 
depends, like many other things, on circumstances ; and 
certainly such conduct has the sanction of the example 
of great names. 

Socrates — who was not of the councils of Athens 
simply because he deemed his office as a teacher of 
wisdom a higher and nobler one — did not think it un- 
w^orthy of himself to serve as a common soldier in 
battle ; and when Plato seeks best to describe, and most 
to dignify, his great master, he causes Alcibiades, among 
other things, to say of him: 



-a 



" I onglit not to omit what Socrates was in battle ; for in tliat 
battle after wbicU the generals decreed to me the prize of courage, 
Socrates alone, of all men, was the saviour of my life, standing by 
me when I had fallen and was wounded, and preserving both myself 
and my arms from the hands of the enemy. But to see Socrates, when 
our army was defeated and scattered in flight at Delias, was a spec- 
tacle worthy to behold. On that occasion, I was among the cavalry, 
and he on foot, heavily armed. After the total rout of our troops, he 
and Laches retreated together. I came up by chance; and seeing 
them, bade them be of good cheer, for that I would not leave them. 
As I was on horseback, and therefore less occupied by a regard of 
my own situation, I could better observe than at Potidoea the beautiful 
spectacle exhibited by Socrates on this emergency." * # * * 

* * * « jjg -walked and darted his regards around with a 
majestic composure, looking tranquilly both on his friends and 
enemies; so that it was evident to every one, even from afar, that 
whoever should venture to attack him would encounter a desperate 
resistance. He and his companion thus departed in safety; for those 
who are scattered in flight are pursued and killed, whilst men 
hesitate to touch those who exhibit such a countenance as that of 
Socrates, even in defeat." 

This is the picture of a sage painted by a sage; and 
why may not great wisdom be the strongest element of 
a great war? 

In the days when the States of Greece were free — 
when Rome was free, when Venice was free — who but 
their great statesmen, counselors, and senators, led their 
armies to victorious battle 1 In the best days of all the 
great and free States, civil place and distinction was 
never held inconsistent with military authority and con- 
duct. So far from it, all history teaches the fact that 
those who have proved themselves most competent to 
direct and administer the affairs of government in times 
of peace, were not only trusted, but were best trusted 
with the conduct of armies in times of war. 

(g i 



m 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 13 

In tliese teachings of history there may be some 
lessons we have yet to learn; and that we have such 
lessons to learn I know was the strong conviction of 
the late Senator. 

It is with no sense of satisfaction that I feel it my 
duty to say that I have been led to the opinion that 
there is much soundness in the opinion he entertained. 

It is but a brief time since the late Senator was 
among us, maintaining our country's cause with wise 
counsel, clothed in eloquent words. When, in August 
last, his duties here as a Senator for the time ceased, he 
devoted himself exclusively to the duties of a soldier. 
Occupying a subordinate position, commanded where he 
was most ht to command, he received his orders. He 
saw and knew the nature of the enterprise he was re- 
quired to undertake. He saw and knew that he was 
required to move urjderneath the shadow of the wings 
of Azrael. He did not — he would not — question the 
requirement made of him. His motto on that day 
was: "A good heart, and no hope." He knew, as was 
known at Balaklava, that some one had blundered ; yet 
he said: "Forward, my brigade, although some one has 
blundered." 

Was this reckless rashness 1 No ! 

It may be called sacrifice, self-sacrifice ; but I, who 
know the man who was the late Senator — the calm, 
self-possessed perfectness of his valor — and who have 
studied all the details of the field of his last offering 
with a sad earnestness, say to you, sir — to this Senate, 
to the country, and particularly to the people of the 
land of the West, where most and best he is known and 
loved — that no rash, reckless regardlessness of danger 

m 



can be attributed to him. It is but just to say of liim, 
that his conduct sprung from a stern hero, patriot, 
martyr spirit, that enabled him to dare unflinchingly — 
with a smile to the green earth, and a smile to the 
bright heavens, and a cheer to his brave companions — 
ascend the altar of sacrifice. 

A poet of the middle ages, speaking of Carthage as 
then a dead city, the grave of which was scarcely 
discernible, says: 

"For cities die, kingdoms die; a little sand and grass cover all 
that was once lofty in them, and glorious ; and yet man, forsooth, 
disdains that he is mortal! Oh, mind of ours, inordinate and proud." 

It is true cities and kingdoms die. but the eternal 
thought lives on. Great thought, incorporate with great 
action, does not die, but lives a universal life, and its 
l)ower is felt vibrating through all spirit and throughout 
all the ages. 

I doubt whether or not we should mourn for any of 
the dead. I am confident that there should be no 
mourning for those who render themselves up as sacri- 
fices in any great, just, and holy cause. It better 
becomes us to praise and dignify them. 

It was the faith of an ancient people that the souls of 
heroes did not rest until their great deeds had been 
hymned by bards, to the sounds of martial music. 

Bards worthy of the ancient time have hymned the 
praise of the great citizen, senator, and soldier who has 
left us. They have showered on his memory 

"Those leaves, which, for the eternal few 
Who wander o'er the paradise of fame, 
In sacred dedication ever grew." 

g: ^iii 



11 -s 

HON. EDWAKD D. BAKER. 15 

I would that I were able to add a single leaf to the 
eternal amaranth. 

In long future years, when our night of horror shall 
have passed, and there shall have come again 

"The welcome morning with its rays of peace," 

young seekers after fame, and young lovers of freedom, 
throughout all this land — yea, and other and distant 
lands — will recognise, honor, and imitate our late asso- 
ciate as one of the undying dead. 

Mr. President, I second the resolutions of the Senator 
from Oregon. 



Address of Mr. Browning, of Illinois. 

Mr. President: On taking my seat in the Senate at 
its special session in July last, my first active participa- 
tion in its business was on the occasion of the proceed- 
ings commemorative of the death of Hon. Stephen A. 
Douglas, my immediate predecessor; and now, sir, at 
the commencement of this my second session, it becomes 
my melancholy duty to bear a part in the ceremonies in 
honor of another, who had been longer a citizen of the 
State of Illinois, whose memory is not less dear to the 
hearts of her people, and whose tragical and untimely 
death has shrouded the State in mourning. 

Hon. Edward D. Baker was, and had ever been, my 
personal and political friend, and, from earliest manhood, 
the relations between us had been of the closest and 
most confidential character that friendship allows; and 
there are but few whose death would have left so large 
a void in my afiections. 



■Cd 



Something my jmiior in years, he was my senior in 
the profession to which we both belonged; and com- 
mencing our professional career in the same State, and 
very near the same time, traveling much upon the same 
circuit, and belonging to the same political party, a 
friendship grew up which was cemented and strength- 
ened by time, and continued, from our first acquaintance 
amid the collisions of the bar and the rivalries of politics, 
without ever having sustained a shock or an interruption 
even for a moment; and I owe it to the memories of 
the past, and to the relations which subsisted between 
us whilst he lived, to offer some poor tribute to his 
worth now that he is dead. 

Few men who have risen to positions of great dis- 
tinction and usefulness, and left the impress of their 
lives upon their country's history, have been less indebted 
to the circumstances of birth and fortune. He inherited 
neither ancestral wealth nor honors; but whatever of 
either he attained was the reward of his own energy 
and talents. He was, very literally, the "architect of 
his own fortunes." 

Commencing the practice of law before he had reached 
the full maturity of manhood, and in what was then a 
border State, but among lawyers whose talents and 
learning shed lustre upon the profession to which they 
belonged, without the patronage of wealth or power, he 
soon made his way to the front rank of the bar, and 
maintained his position there to the hour of his death. 

But he did not confine himself exclusively to profes- 
sional pursuits, and to the care of his own private affairs. 
He was a man of rare endowments, and of such fitness 
and aptitude for public employments as were sure to 



S- 



¥• 



HON. EDWAllD D. BAKER. 17 

attract public attention. He could not, if lie would, 
have made his way through life along its quiet, peaceful, 
and secluded walks; and it does him no discredit to say 
he would not if he could. 

He was too fully in sympathy with his kind to he 
indifferent to anything which affected their welfare, and 
too heroic in character to remain a passive spectator of 
great and stirring events. He was eminently a man of 
action; and although fond of literature and science and 
art, and possessed of a refined and cultivated taste, he 
yet loved the sterner conflicts of life more than the quiet 
conquests of the closet; and whilst a citizen of Illinois, 
served her both as a soldier and civilian, and won dis- 
tinction wherever he acted. He had elasticity, strength, 
versatility, and fervor of intellect, and a mind full of 
resources. 

His talents were both varied and brilliant, and capable 
of great achievements; but their usefulness was, perhaps, 
somewhat impaired by a peculiarity of physical organi- 
zation, which made him one of the most restless of 
men, and incapable of the close, steady, and persevering 
mental application without which great results cannot 
often be attained. It was not fickleness or unsteadiness 
of purpose, but a proud and impatient spuming of re- 
straint, contempt for the beaten track of mental pro- 
cesses, and disgust with the dullness and weariness of 
confinement and inaction. But this defect was, to a very 
great extent, compensated by the wonderful ease and 
rapidity with which he could master any subject upon 
which he chose to concentrate the powers of his mind; 
by the marvelous facility with which he acquired 
knowledge, and the felicity with which he could use it. 



-B 



-a 



(n; ■ — ■ fq] 

18 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



"Whatever he could do at all he could do at once, and 
up to the full measure of his capacity. Whatever he 
could comprehend at all he comprehended with the 
quickness of intuition, and gained but little afterwards 
by investigation and elaboration. He did not reach 
intellectual results as other men do — by the slow pro- 
cesses of analysis or induction ; but if he could reach 
them at all, he could do it at a bound. And yet it was 
not jumping at conclusions, for he could always state, 
with almost mathematical clearness and precision, the 
premises from which he made his deductions, and guide 
you along the same path he had traveled to the same 
goal. He saw at a glance all the material, and all the 
relations of the material, which he intended to use, to 
the subject in hand, but which another would have 
carefully and laboriously to search out and collect to be 
enabled to see at all, and diligently to collate before 
understanding its uses and relations. 

To a greater extent than most men, he combined the 
force and severity of logic with grace, fancy, and elo- 
quence, filling at the bar at the same time the character 
of the astute and profound lawyer, and the able, eloquent, 
and successful advocate; whilst in the Senate, the wise, 
prudent, and discreet statesman was combined with the 
chaste, classical, brilUant, and persuasive orator. 

But with all his aptitude lor, and adaptation to, the 
highest and noblest pursuits of the civilian, he had a 
natural taste, talent, and fondness for the life of the 
soldier. There was something in the bugle-blast of 
war and the cannon's roar which roused his soul to its 
profoundest depths; and he could no more remain in 
ino-lorious ease at home, while the desolations of war 



0^ 



-m 



P : : ^ 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 19 

l)lackenecl and blasted the land, than the proud eao-le 
could descend from his home in the cloud to dwell with 
the moping owl. 

Three times, in his not protracted life, he led our 
citizen soldiers to the embattled plain to meet in deadly 
conflict his country's foes. Alas! that he shall lead 
them no more! that he shall never more marshal them 
for the glorious strife ! never more rouse to the " signal 
trumpet tone!" He has fallen! "The fresh dust is 
chill upon the Ijreast that burned erewhile with fires 
that seemed immortal." 

"He sleeps his last sleep — lie lias fouglit liis last battle; 
No soiiucl shall awake him to gloiy again." 

He fell — as I think he would have preferred to flill 
had he had the choice of the mode of death — in the 
storm of battle, cheerinoj his brave followers on to dutv 
in the service of his adopted country, to which he felt 
that he owed much, which he loved well, and had 
served long and faithfully. It does him no dishonor to 
say that he was a man of great ambition, and that he 
yearned after military renown; but his ambition was 
chastened by his j)atriotism, his strong sense of justice, 
and his humanity; and its fires never burned so fiercely 
in his bosom as to tempt him to purchase honor, glory, 
and distinction for himself, by needlessly sacrificing, or 
even imperiling, the lives of others. He was no untried 
soldier, with a name yet to win. It was already high on 
the roll of fame, and indissolubly linked with his coun- 
try's history. Years ago, at home and abroad, he had 
drawn his sword in his country's cause, and shed his 
blood in defence of her rights. Years ago he had led 



our soldiers to battle, and by his gallantry shed new 
lustre upon our arms, and historic interest upon Cerro 
Gordo's heights; and now he had that fame to guard 
and protect. He had to defend his already written page 
of history from blot or stain, as well as to add to it 
another leaf equally radiant and enduring. But, Mr. 
President, it would be a poor, inadequate, and unworthy 
estimate of his character which should explore only a 
selfish ambition and aspirations for individual glory for 
the sources of his action. 

The impelhng causes were far higher and nobler. 
He was a true, immovable, incorruptible, and unshrink- 
ing patriot. He was the fast, firm friend of civil and 
religious liberty, and believed that they should be the 
common heritage and blessing of all mankind; and that 
they could be secured and enjoyed only through the 
instrumentality of organized constitutional government, 
and submission to, and obedience of, its laws; and the 
conviction upon his mind was deep and profound that if 
the wicked rebellion which had been inaugurated went 
unrebuked, and treason triumphed over law, constitu- 
tional government in North America would be utterly 
annihilated, to be followed by the confusion of anarchy, 
and the confusion of anarchy to be succeeded by the op- 
pressions and atrocities of despotism. He believed that 
whatever the horrors, and plagues, and desolations of 
civil war might be, they would still be far less in mag- 
nitude and duration than the plagues and calamities 
which would inevitably follow upon submission and 
separation. The contest in which we are engaged had 
been, without cause or pretext of cause, forced upon us. 
We had to accept the strife, or so submit to an arrogant 



@- 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 21 

assumption of superionty of right as to show ourselves 
unworthy of the hberties and blessings which the blood, 
and treasure, and wisdom, and virtue of illustrious sires 
had achieved for us; and he believed that the issue of 
the contest was powerfully and vitally to affect the 
welfare and happiness of the American peoj^le, if not, 
indeed, of all other nations, for centuries yet to be. 
With these views, both just and patriotic, he recognised 
it as his duty to give his services to his country when- 
ever and in whatever capacity they could be of most 
value and importance ; and with as much of self-al)nega- 
tion as the frailties of humanity would allow, he took his 
place in the serried ranks of war; and in the strict and 
discreet discharge of his duty as a soldier, fighting for 
his country in a holy cause, he fell. 

And it is, Mr. President, to me, his friend, a source of 
peculiar gratification, that the history of the disastrous 
day which terminated his brilliant career, when it shall 
have been truthfully written, will be his full and suffi- 
cient vindication from any charge of temerity or reckless- 
ness regarding the lives of those intrusted to his care. 
He was brave, ardent, and impetuous, and "when war's 
stern strength was on his soul," he no doubt felt that 
"one crowded hour of glorious life was worth an age 
without a name." But his was not the fitful impetuosity 
of the whirlwind, which unfits for self-control or the 
command of others, but the strong, steady, and resistless 
roll of the stream within its prescribed limits, and to its 
sure and certain object. Not the impetuosity which 
culminates in fantastic rashness, but that which, in the 
j)resence of danger, is exalted to the sublimity of 
heroism. 

^^j 



22 OBITUARY ADDEESSES- 

I have said he was ambitious, but there was never 
ambition with less of the taint and dross of selfishness. 
He was incaj^able of a mean and unmanly envy, and 
was ever quick to perceive and ready to acknowledge 
the merit of a rival, and would stifle his own desires, 
and postpone his own aggrandizement, for the advance- 
ment of a friend. Nobly generous, he could and did 
make sacrifices of both pecuniary and political advantages 
to his friendships, which, with him, were real, sincere, 
and lasting. He never sought to drag others down from 
moral or social, professional or political eminence, that 
he might rise upon the ruin; nor regarded the good 
fortune of another, in whatever vocation or department 
of life, as a wrong done him, or as any impediment to 
his own prosperity. Brave and self-reliant, but neither 
rash nor presumptuous, he could avenge or forgive 
an injury with a grace and promptitude which did 
equal honor to his boldness of spirit and kindness of 
heart. Under insult or indignity he was fierce and 
dehant, and could teach an enemy alike to fear and 
respect him, and, in the collisions of life's battle, may 
have given something of the impression of harshness of 
temper; but in the domestic circle, amid the social 
throng, and under friendship's genial and enchanting 
influences, he was as gentle and confiding in his affec- 
tions as a woman, and as tender and trustful as a child. 

Senator Baker was not only a lawyer, an orator, a 
statesman, and a soldier, but he was also a poet, and at 
all times, when deeply in earnest, both spoke and acted 
under high poetic inspiration. At one time, when I 
traveled upon the same circuit with him and others v^ho 
have since been renowned in the history of Illinois, it 



-m 



was no uncommon thing, after the labors of the day in 
court were ended, and forensic battles had been lost and 
won, for the lawyers to forget the asperities which had 
been engendered by the conflicts of the bar in the 
innocent if not profitable pastime of writing verses for 
the amusement of each other and their friends; and I 
well remember with what greater facility than others 
he could dash from his pen eifusions sparkling all over 
with poetic gems; and if all that he has thus written 
could be collected together, it would make no mean 
addition to the poetic literature of our country. Its 
beauty, grace, and vivacity would certainly redeem it 
from oblivion. 

Yet he did not aspire to the character of a poet, but 
wrought the poetic vein only for the present amusement 
of himself and intimate friends; and I am not aware 
that any of the productions of which I speak ever 
passed beyond that limited circle. They were not per- 
petuated by "the art preservative of all other arts." 

The same thing is true of his forensic eiforts, many 
of which were distinguished by a brilliancy, po^^'er, and 
eloquence, and a classic grace and purity, that would 
have done honor to the most renowned barrister, but 
which live now only in the traditions of the country. 
Stenography was at that day an unknown art in Illinois, 
and writing out a speech would have been a prodigality 
of time and labor of which an Illinois lawyer was 
probably never guilty. 

To Senators who were his cotemporaries here, and 
who have heard the melody of his voice — who have 
witnessed his powerful and impassioned bursts of elo- 
quence, and felt the witchery of the spell that he has 



^ 



[C ;g] 

24 OBITUxVRY ADDEESSES- 

tlirown upon them — it were vain for me to speak of his 
displays in this Chamber. It is no disparagement to 
his survivors to say that he stood the peer of any gen- 
tleman on this floor in all that constitutes the able 
and skilful debater, and the classical, persuasive, and 
enchanting orator. 

But his clear and manly voice shall be heard in these 
halls no more. Never again shall these crowded galle- 
ries hang breathless on his words; never again the 
thronging multitudes who gathered where'er he spoke be 
thrilled by the magic of his eloquence. The voice that 
could soothe to delicious repose, or rouse to a tempest 
of passion, is now hushed forever. The heart once so 
fiery brave lies pulseless in the tomb, and all that is left 
to his country or his home, is the memory of what 
he was. 

I will not attempt, Mr. President, to speak poor, cold 
words of sympathy and consolation to the stricken hearts 
of his family. I know, sir, how bitter and immedicable 
their anguish is. I know, sir, how it rends the heart- 
strings, all willing though we be, to lay our loved ones 
as sacrifices even on our country's altar. The death- 
dealing hand of war has invaded my own household and 
slain its victim there, and I know that words bring no 
healing to the grief which follows these bereavements. 
The heart turns despairingly away from " honor's voice," 
which provokes not the silent dust, and from the flatteries 
which cannot 

"Soothe tlie dull, cold ear of death;" 
and the spirits ebb, and 

"Life's enchanting scenes their lustre lose, 
And lessen in oiu- sight," 

i- 



m ■ ^1 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 25 



Time alone can bring healing on its wing; 

"Time! the beautifiei- of the dead, 
Adorner of the ruin, comforter 
And only healer Avhere the heart hath bled," 

can alone mitigate, chasten, and sanctify the crushing 
sorrow. And not till after Time has done its gentle 
work, and stilled the tempest of feeling, can the sorrow- 
ing hearts around his now desolate hearthstone iind 
consolation in remembering how worthily he lived, and 
how gloriously he died; that he is "fortune's now, and 
fame's;" and that when peace, on downy pinion, comes 
again to bless our troubled land, and all hearts have 
renewed their allegiance to the beneficent government 
for which he died, history will claim him as its own, and 
canonize him in the hearts of his countrymen as a 
heroic martyr in the great cause of human rights, and 
chronicle his deeds on pa^-es illuminated with the 
gratitude of freemen, and as imperishable as the love 
of liberty. 



Address of Mr. Cowan, of Pennsylvania. 

Mr. President: Pennsylvania also droops her head 
among the States that mourn on this occasion. She, 
too, sheds her tears and utters her wail of lamentation 
over the fall of the senator and soldier. She was his 
foster-mother. A national orphan, in his infancy and 
youth she was his guardian for nurture. Perhaps he 
had no recollection of any other country he could call 
his "native land" but Pennsylvania, and she loved him 



-m 



26 OBITUARY ADDRESSES- 

as though he had been actually to her "manor born." 
He died under her regimental flag, bearing her commis- 
sion, and leading her soldiers in the deadly strife. She 
therefore laments his heroic and untimely death with a 
grief that yields to that of none else in its depth and 
intensity. Let Oregon, his last and fondest love, steep 
herself in sorrow as she may, Pennsylvania still claims 
an equal place at her side in this national manifestation 
of distress at his loss. She can hardly now realize that 
in his life he was not all her own, since he died so near 
her, and was carried from the battle-field borne upon 
her shield. 

It is not my purpose either to speak of the virtues 
and accomplishments which adorned the private life of 
Colonel Baker, or to enter into the detail of his public 
services to the country: all that has been done by his 
old and cherished friends, as they only could do it; and 
the tribute to his worth they have oflfered here to-day is 
in itself a noble monument to his memory. 

It was not my fortune to have known him personally 
for a long time; and I shall endeavor only to give the 
impression he made upon me, and I think also upon the 
public, by his well-known career in such widely different 
situations. 

This man had a remarkable life, and his history is 
strikingly illustrative of that of his race. He was evi- 
dently of pure English blood — at home anywhere on 
the globe, with a strong desire to be dominant wherever 
he was. To such a one the American continent, with its 
restless population, furnished the theatre exactly suited 
to his tastes and abilities; and had not that population 
been here, he would have brought them if he could, 

ii m 



© — — w 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 27 

They were an emigrating and colonizing people, and he 
was a man eminently of that sort; so that wherever they 
went he was sure to be in the van to lead them. He 
would have lived all over the world had it been possible, 
and he would have carried with him his civilization and 
favorite institutions. 

Born in London, his first voyage was across the 
Atlantic in his earliest inflmcy. During his youth his 
home was in Philadelphia; his next move was away across 
the Alleghanies, and his young manhood was passed 
upon the great western prairies; but, not content, he 
departs from thence, and in riper age — in his prime — 
he was beyond the great deserts and the Rocky Mountains 
dwelling on the shores of the Pacific. He had leaped 
the continent. 

Nor did he wander always along isothermal lines, but 
with the boldest of his race, he extended his range from 
the great lakes of North America to the Caribbean 
sea. He had tried causes nearly as far north as Chicago, 
and he had helped to build a railroad across the Isthmus 
of Darien. He had raised regiments in Illinois, and led 
them to l)attle in the gorges and on the high plateaux of 
the Mexican Cordilleras. No climatic differences seemed 
to deter him, and he trod the torrid with the same 
fearless freedom he did the temperate zone. No matter 
to him where his tent was pitched — whether on the 
cool and salubrious banks of the Upper Mississippi, or 
on the stifling and pestilential banks of the Chagres — it 
was all one. He had settled on the plain of Tacubaya, 
beside the failing sea of Anahuac, nearly as soon as 
beside the snow-clad mountains which overhang the 
Columbia river. All these seduced him by the very 



-m 



m 

28 OBITUARY AI>J)RESSES. 

_ - 

novelty of their dangers. Had lie lived in olden times, 
he had been a viking — a sea-rover — and had come down 
with Hengist and Horsa, skilled in the Sagas, and knowing 
the Runes by heart; or he might, perhaps, have come 
over with Leif, the son of Eric the Red; because anything 
that was noble, dangerous, and difficult had such charms 
for him that he sought it as naturally as he would have 
sought food when he was hungry. This was his Saxo- 
Norman nature, and to gratity its cravings he would 
have been delighted to have gone to the Holy Land 
with the Crusaders, or to have led a company of free 
lancers in the wars of Italy. 

He was also a man of intellect — cool, clear, sharp, and 
ready. His culture was large, without being bookish; 
he was learned, without being a scholar; and studious, 
without being a student. He acquired that which he 
thought useful to him, and he had it all at his fingers' 
ends; and his first glance was so keen that it served 
him as well as an hour's gaze — perhaps better. It 
cannot be doubted that he was a great criminal lawyer — 
great by force of his reason rather than by the illumina- 
tion of the books — and no jury could well withstand his 
eloquence. He was a true orator, because he confined 
himself to his subject; and expressing himself with such 
ease that all understood him, he was effective. He did 
not seem to trouble himself so much as to whether he 
was following a classic model as whether he was get- 
ting everybody to believe just as he did. He never 
went out of his way for etfect; therefore, he produced 
effects. Drawing the sentiments he uttered as they 
welled up fresh from his soul, the pitchers of his audience 
were all filled, and they went away satisfied. He had 



m- 



-m 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 29 

no art, because he had the higliest art — that of simphcity. 
All those who heard him thought he was saying just 
what they would have said could they have stolen his 
wondrous power of speech. 

At the hustinofs he must have been unrivaled; and it 
is no wonder he was the idol of the people wherever 
he went. A man with such human sympathies, and 
such rare gifts, could not fliil to find some response in 
every heart. He had a fine personal appearance, and 
his manners were self-possessed and easy as actual con- 
tact with all ranks of men could make them. He was 
also a brave man, physically and morally; and although 
it is said that, before his last terrific battle, he had 
heard the weird song of the fatal sisters, and felt that 
his doom impatiently awaited him, yet he bore himself 
as gallantly in the fight as if on parade ; and true to his 
instincts as a soldier and gentleman, his last moment on 
the earth was loaded with the double duty of directing 
the battle and giving cheer and condolence to the officers 
and soldiers who were maimed and bleeding about him. 
Still Heaven was kind — he was saved all lingering tor- 
ture, for his life went out through a dozen wounds, any 
one of which had been mortal. 

He is gone! whether the victim of man's folly, or 
of inexorable fate, is for future inquiry; and it is hoped 
that the tears of his countrymen, shed over his grave in 
sorrow, may not become hot with indignation against 
any wrongly accused with causing the disaster. He is 
gone ! and his name and character henceforth belong to 
history. His children will glory in both, and be known 
to men because of him — the proudest legacy he could 
leave them. His country, too, will honor his memory; 

m i 



■m 



30 OBITUARY APDRESSES- 

and when the roll of her dead heroes is called, his name 
will resound through the American Valhalla among the 
proudest and most heroic. 



Address of Mr. Dixon, of Connecticut. 

Mr. President: When death, in any of its ordinary 
forms, enters this Chamber, and terminates the labors, 
the responsibilities, and the anxieties of the position 
here occupied, the occasion is necessarily one of the 
highest interest to us as members of this body, and 
scarcely less so to the entire nation. How much of 
added interest is imparted by the peculiar circumstances 
that surround the sad event which we are this day 
called to deplore ! A senator, in the prime and glory of 
manliood, enjoying the homage so lavishly and cheerfully 
paid hy mankind to genius; endowed with an eloquence 
truly wonderful in its scope, its fullness, and its resistless 
power; and adding to this full measure of political honor 
that still more brilliant and more coveted object of 
ambition in noble minds — military glory — is suddenly 
arrested in his distinguished career. The voice to which 
men thronged to listen with such eager attention is 
silent. The How of that torrent of ideas, expressed in 
that boundless copiousness of language, and illustrated 
by that exhaustless exuberance of fancy which has often 
excited our wonder not less than our admiration, has 
ceased forever with the life wdiich our departed friend 
offered on the field of battle, as his willing sacrifice in the 
cause of his country. A life like his — so honored, so 
occupied, so rewarded by all that men most desire on 



U- 



^ r^ 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 31 



earth, and so closed, in such a cause as that which his 
martyr-blood has doubly consecrated — surely is worthy 
not only of interrupting the daily offices of the Senate 
and of the Executive, but of arresting the attention and 
exciting the profound sorrow of a. mourning nation. 

The peculiar cii'cumstances of the death of Colonel 
Baker have been already related. After he assumed 
a command in the army of the Potomac, although not 
unaccustomed to military hfe, there was, as many of his 
friends perceived, an unwonted sadness in his expression, 
always serious and contemplative. He had looked upon 
civil war as an event certain to happen, unless averted 
by some extraordinary means of negotiation. He had 
declared himself willing to sacrifice somewhat of his 
own not extreme views, to avert the impending calamity, 
which he so clearly foresaw. But when the last hope of a 
peaceful solution of our troubles, had been destroyed by 
the flagrant acts of rebels in arms against the govern- 
ment, he was not satisfied with merely giving his vote 
as a senator, and his voice as an orator to the cause of 
the Constitution. His sense of duty demanded of him 
more than this. Yet, as I have already intimated, there 
was perceived a more than usually saddened expression 
in his eye, and an almost tender melancholy in the tones 
of his voice, which might have satisfied any observer 
that no selfish motive, no vulgar ambition, had prompted 
hhn in the sacrifice he was making. I was not therefore 
surprised when, in the last conversation I had with him, 
I discovered with how deep a sjjirit of patriotic devotion 
he had entered the military service. 

The death which has so gloriously ended his earthly 
labors was not unexpected; and in recalling his words 



■m 



g ^ 

32 OBITUARY A1)])RESSES- 



on the occasion to which I alhide, I can hardly suppose 
it was undesircd. He felt and deplored, more deeply 
perhaps than most of us, the condition of the country ; 
and there was also, possibly, a presentiment in his highly 
imaginative mind of his approaching end. If so, there 
was no dread, no shrinking from any post of duty, how- 
ever perilous. But I well remember how — here, near 
the spot where I now stand, in language more emphatic 
and more expressive than any I can now recall or com- 
mand — he disavowed having been actuated by any desire 
for military glory, in taking up arms for the defence of 
the Constitution and the Union. It was the voice of 
duty, and this alone, which called him to the field; and, 
in ol)eying that call, he felt that he was offering his life. 
I think, too, there was that in his bold and adventurous 
spirit, that gave a mysterious charm to any duty accom- 
panied by danger. Indeed, his nature seemed scarcely 
capaljle of quiet and repose. There was a restlessness, 
an impatience in his constitution, which would not suffer 
him to be an unparticipating spectator in any great con- 
flict, much less in one that involved the existence of the 
nation. For him, therefore, to withhold his hand from 
the sword, in this great controversy, would have been 
an impossibility under any circumstances. Had he 
known what death he was to die, his course would have 
been the same; for he was evidently born of that blood 
and imbued with that spirit which makes men feel 
that it is 

"Better to die beneath the shock, 
Thau moulder, piecemeal, on the rock," 

Although I became somewhat familiarly acquainted 
with Colonel Baker nearly sixteen years ago, I know 



■m 



IP a 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKEK. 33 

little of Ills early mental habits, or of his course of dis- 
cipline and study. Yet it was impossible to listen to 
his ordinary conversation, or to his elaborate efforts in 
the Senate, or, more especially, to those unsurpassed 
specimens of eloquence which, without a moment's 
preparation, he threw off, burning and sparkling, in the 
heat and glow of extemporaneous debate, yet profusely 
illustrated by allusions to all the varied fields of litera- 
ture and science, without being assured that his intellect, 
naturally of a high order, had been cultivated, strength- 
ened, and enlarged, by close and careful study, and 
enriched and adorned by an intimate acquaintance with 
the choicest literature of our language. As an orator, 
he was remarkable for an assured self-possession, which 
gave him, at all times and under all circumstances, the 
complete control of his mental powers. To this he 
added a command of the English language so full and 
complete, as perhaps to tempt him sometimes to indulge 
in an affluence of diction too ornate and copious to 
satisfy the strictest canons of criticism. Yet who that 
listened to him in popular assemblies, — who that heard 
or read his speeches in the Senate, or his occasional 
addresses — especially that memorable oration uttered 
on the shores of the Pacific, over the dead body of his 
friend, the brave, the still lamented Broderick, the sur- 
passing eloquence of which seemed to resound, in sad, 
funereal tones, as far as the Atlantic coast, — could have 
been willing that one of those glowing, expressive, 
perhaps redundant words, had been omitted? 

The brilliant talents of Senator Baker — his unsur- 
passed powers as an orator, his self-poised reliance upon 
his own capacities, his courage and his patriotism — 

■ m 



vQ 



34 OBITUARY AI)])RESSES. 

would not have been sufficient in themselves, without 
the higher moral qualities which I think he possessed, 
to win for him that large share of the admiration of his 
countrymen which he enjoyed. He was, I have reason 
to believe, not only a great, but a good man. He ac- 
knowledged his accountability to his maker, and walked 
through life in the light of that law of God, which irra- 
diates the path of every man who seeks to know and to 
perform his duty. Of the peculiar tenets of his religious 
faith, I am uninformed; but his life, judging from its 
outward manifestation here, was that of a Christian 
statesman. What glories illustrated its close a grateful 
country will not soon forget. It needed only to have 
been breathed out in the arms of victory to have been 
the end which he would have chosen. But though that 
might have added to the joy with which he welcomed 
death, nothing in his end was wanting to its glory. 
What nobler epitaph could he have desired — what 
nobler epitaph could any of those patriots desire who 
now, in unnumljered hosts, emulous of his fame, are 
ready to share his fate on the field of battle — than this: 
He died for his Country! 



Address of Mr. Suimner, of Massachusetts. 

Mr. President: The Senator to whom we to-day say 
farewell was generous in funeral homage to others. 
More than once he held great companies in rapt atten- 
tion while he did honor to the dead. Over the coffin 
of Broderick he proclaimed the dying utterance of this 
early victim, and gave to it the fiery wings of his own 

© ^.^ —m 



^ . p 

HON. EDWAED D. BAKER. 35 

eloquence: "They have killed me, because I was op- 
posed to the extension of slavery and a corrupt adminis- 
tration;" and as the impassioned orator repeated these 
words, his own soul was knit in sympathy with the 
dead; and thus, at once, did he endear himself to the 
friends of freedom, even at a distance. 

"Who would not sing for Lyciclas? He knew 
Himself to sing and bnild the lofty rhyme." 

There are two forms of eminent talent which are 
kindred in their eflects — each producing an instant 
present impression, each holding crowds in suspense, 
and each kindling enthusiastic admiration. I mean the 
talent of the orator and the talent of the soldier. Each 
of these, when successful, wins immediate honor, and 
reads his praise in a nation's eyes. Baker was orator 
and soldier. To him belongs the rare renown of this 
double character. Perhaps he carried into war some- 
thing of the confidence inspired 1)y the conscious sway 
of great multitudes, as he surely brought into speech 
something of the ardor of war. Call him, if you will, 
the Prince Pupert of battle; he was also the Prince 
Pupert of debate. 

His success in life attests not only his own remarkable 
genius, but the benign hospitality of our institutions. 
Born on a foreign soil, he was to our country only a 
step-son; but were he now alive, I doubt not he would 
gratefully declare that the country was never to him an 
ungentle step-mother. The child of poverty, he was 
brought, while yet in tender years, to Philadelphia, 
where he l^egan life an exile. His earliest days were 
passed in the loom rather than at school; and yet, liom 
this lowliness, he achieved tlie highest posts of trust 

iQl 




4- 



and honor — being at the same time senator and general. 
It was the lioast of Pericles, in his limeral oration at 
the Ceraraicus over the dead who had fallen in battle, 
that the Athenians were ready to communicate all the 
advantages which they enjoyed; that they did not ex- 
clude the stranger from their walls; and that Athens 
was a city open to the human family. The same boast 
may be proudly repeated by us with better reason, as 
we commemorate our dead fallen in battle. 

From Philadelphia the poor man's son was carried 
to the West, where he grew with the growth of that 
surprising region. He became one of its children ; and 
his own manhood was closely associated with its power- 
ful progress. The honors of the bar and of Congress 
soon were his ; but his impatient temper led him from 
these paths into the Mexican war, where he gallantly 
took the place of Shields — torn with wounds and almost 
^ead — at Cerro Gordo. But the great West, beginning 
to teem with population, did not satisfy his ambition, 
and he repaired to California. The child whose infancy 
was rocked on the waves of the Atlantic — whose man- 
hood was formed in the broad and open expanse of the 
prairie — now sought a home on the shores of the Pacific, 
saying, in the buoyant confidence of his nature, 

"No pent lip Utica contracts our powers; 
But the whole boundless continent is ours." 

There again his genius was promptly recognised. A 
ncNV State, which had just taken its place in the Union, 
sent him as Senator; and Oregon first became truly 
known to us on this floor by his eloquent lips. 

In the Senate he at once took the place of orator. 
His voice was not full or sonorous, but it was sharp 



— m 



p 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 37 

and clear. It was penetrating, rather than commancUng; 
and yet, when touched by his ardent nature, it became 
sympathetic, and even musical. His countenance, body, 
and gesture, all shared the unconscious inspiration of 
his voice, and he went on, master of his audience — 
master also of himself. All his faculties were completely 
at command. Ideas, illustrations, words, seemed to 
come unbidden, and to range themselves in harmonious 
forms, as in the walls of ancient Tliebes each stone 
took its proper place of its own accord, moved only l)y 
the music of a lyre. His fame as a speaker was so 
peculiar, even before he appeared among us, that it was 
sometimes supposed he might lack those solid powers, 
without which the oratorical faculty itself can exercise 
only a transient influence. But his speech on this floor 
in reply to a slaveholding conspirator, now an open rebel, 
showed that his matter was as good as his manner, and 
that, while he was a master of fence, he was also a master 
of ordnance. His controversy was graceful, sharp, and 
flashing, like a cimeter; but his argument was powerful 
and sweeping, like a battery. 

You have not forgotten that speech. Perhaps the 
argument against the sophism of secession was never 
better arranged and combined, or more simply popular- 
ized for the general apprehension. A generation had 
passed since that traitorous absurdity — the fit cover of 
conspiracy — had been exposed. It had shrunk for awhile 
into darkness, driven back by the massive logic of Daniel 
Webster and the honest sense of Andrew Jackson. 

"The times have been, 
That when the brains were out the man would die, 
And there an end; but now they rise again." 



-a 



■? 



OBITUAEY ADDRESSES- 



As the pretension showed itself anew, our orator 
luidertook again to expose it. How thoroughly he did 
this, now with historic, and now with forensic skill, 
while his whole effort was elevated by a charming, 
ever-ready eloquence, which itself was aroused to new 
power by the interruptions which he encountered — 
all this is present to your minds. That speech passed 
at once into the permanent literature of the country, 
wdiile it gave to its author an assured position in 
this body. 

Another speech showed him in a different character. 
It ^^■as his instant reply to the Kentucky Senator, not 
then expelled from this body. The occasion was pecu- 
liar. A Senator, with treason in his heart, if not on his 
lips, had just taken his seat. Our lamented Senator, 
who had entered the Chamber direct from his camj), 
rose at once to reply. He began simply and calmly; 
but as he proceeded his fervid soul broke forth in words 
of surpassing power. As on the former occasion he 
had presented the well-ripened fruits of study, so now 
he spoke with the spontaneous utterance of his own 
natural and exuberant eloquence, meeting the polished 
traitor at every point with weapons keener and brighter 
than his own. 

Not content with the brilliant opportunities of this 
Chamber, he accepted a commission in the army, and 
vaulted from the Senate to the saddle, as he had already 
vaulted from Illinois to California. With a zeal that 
never tired, after recruiting men, drawn by the attrac- 
tion of his name, in New York and Philadelphia, and 
elsewhere, he held his brigade in camp near the Capital, 
so that he passed easily from one to the other, and 

m m 



© -Q 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 39 

thus alternated between the duties of a senator and a 
general. ^ 

His latter career was short, though shining. At a 
disastrous encounter near Ball's Bluff he fell, pierced 
by nine balls. That brain which had been the seat and 
organ of such sul^tle power, swaying assemblies, and 
giving to this child of obscurity place and command 
among his fellow-men, was now rudely shattered; and 
that bosom which had throbbed so bravely was rent by 
numerous wounds. He died with his face to the foe; 
and he died so instantly, that he passed without pain 
from the service of his country to the service of his 
God — while with him passed more than one gallant 
youth, the hope of family and friends, sent forth by my 
own honored Commonwealth. It is sweet and be- 
coming to die for one's country. Such a death — 
sudden, but not unprepared for — is the crown of the 
patriot soldier's life. 

But the question is painfully asked, who was the 
author of this tragedy, now filling the Senate Chamber, 
as it has already filled the country, with mourning? 
There is a strong desire to hold somebody responsible, 
where so many perished so unprofitably. But we need 
not appoint committees or study testimony -in order to 
kn(jw precisely who took this precious life. That great 
criminal is easily detected — still erect and defiant, without 
concealment or disguise. The guns, the balls, and the 
men that fired them, are of little importance. It is the 
Power behind them all, saying, "The State, it is I," 
which took this precious life ; and this Power is Slavery. 
The nine balls which slew our departed brother came 
from Slavery. Every gaping wound of his slashed 



■m 



40 . OBITUARY ADDRESSES- 

])osom testifies against Slavery. Every drop of his 
generous blood cries out from the ground against Slavery. 
The brain so rudely shattered, and the tongue so suddenly 
silenced in death, speak now with more than living 
eloquence against Slavery. To hold others responsible, is 
to hold the dwarf agent and to dismiss the giant principal. 
Nor shall we do great service if we merely criticise some 
local blunder, while we leave untouched that flital for- 
bearance through which the weakness of the rebellion 
is changed into strength, and the strength of our armies 
is changed into weakness. 

Let not our grief to-day be a hollow pageant; let 
it not expend itself in this funeral pomp. It must be- 
come a motive and an impulse to patriot action. But 
patriotism itself — that commanding charity, embracing 
so many other charities — is only a name, and nothing 
else, unless you resolve — calmly, plainly, solemnly — that 
Slavery, — the barbarous enemy of our country; the 
irreconcilable foe of our Union; the violator of our 
Constitution; the disturber of our peace; the vampire 
of our national life, sucking its best blood; the assassin 
of our children, and the murderer of our dead senator, — 
shall be struck down. And the way is easy. The just 
Avenger is at hand, with weapon of celestial temper. 
Let it be drawn. Until this is done, the patriot, dis- 
cerning clearly the secret of our weakness, can only 
say, sorrowfully — 



"bleed, bleed, poor country! 

Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure, 
For goodness dare not check thee!" 



•a) 



g . 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 41 



Address of Mr. Latham, of CaUfornia. 

Mr. President: Several years ago, in my own home, 
one of the most brilhant tributes to the talented dead I 
ever heard, fell from the lips of him whose memory we 
to-day unite to honor. After a feeling review of the 
eloquence and genial nature of the gifted Ferguson, Col- 
onel Baker suddenly paused, and, with a sadness of tone 
that was a fitting echo to the thought, exclaimed, "Who 
will thus speak of me wh^-^ ^ am dead?" The desire 
then expressed, hut no doubt soon forgotten, is more 
than fulfilled in the just tribute we must all pay to the 
gallant Baker. 

Mr. President, during the lifetime of the deceased, 
although not classified among his warmest friends, yet 
our relations were of the most amicable and cordial 
nature. Always opposed in political opinion, through 
several strifeful years, the pleasant recollection yet re- 
mains of not one unkind word or act to blight the 
respect felt for him while living, and my sincere sorrow 
at his death. I never knew a man of more kindness of 
disposition, more willing to make allowance for the 
shortcomings common to all, or more ready in praise, 
when deserved. Seemingly conscious of his power, he 
never deemed it necessary for his own advancement to 
disparage true talent and personal worth in others. An 
entire absence of vindictive malice, the quick forgetful- 
ness of even an injury or wrong inflicted, quiet compo- 
sure amid trying scenes of an eventful life, all bespoke 
those gentle qualities which made him a fond father, a 
good husband, and a devoted friend. 



It is not my purpose to analyze Colonel Baker's 
character. Others, who enjoyed more of his confidence, 
can speak more accurately. If one quality marked him 
in public life more than any other, and impressed his 
whole career, it was his singleness of purpose. His 
early struggles in life, his self-taught mind, his school of 
adversity, his ardent and poetical temperament, all in- 
fused into his very soul the most powerful and sincere 
love of individual emulation and freedom, in the broad- 
est acceptation of that term. He has left upon record 
as glowing sentiments as -^^'^^ fell from the lips of man 
in that great cause. Upon this subject, on every occa- 
sion — at the bar, on the hustings, and in the Senate — 
wherever his mind seized upon it, it became not " elo- 
quence," it was fiery inspiration. Views upon the rights 
of human liberty and the dignity of free labor, were with 
him no "mawkish sentimentaKiy;" they controlled and 
influenced his whole life from boyhood to the grave. 
Hence it was that when this unprecedented rebellion 
raised its front against our just and free government, 
Senator Baker, by his life and the occupation of each 
moment, was willing to prove the sincerity of his words. 
But two weeks prior to his death, he remarked to me, 
as he had to others: "I shall never come out this strug- 
gle alive. The presentment of death is upon me." 
Even then the dark wings of the coming messenger 
were over him, and he walked courageously forward 
l)eneath their sad shadow — 

"As drops of rain foil into some dark well, 
And from below comes a scarce audible sound, 
So fall our tliouglits into the dark licreafter, 
And tlieir mysterious eclio reaches us." 



m 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 43 

Endeavoring to persuade him that he should not give 
way to gloomy forebodings, well calculated to destroy his 
peace of mind and usefulness in his duties, I shall never 
forget, Senators, the sad but earnest manner in which he 
replied: "I am charged with having much to do by my 
speech in bringing these troubles upon our country. I 
only hope to have more to do by my acts in ending 
them." 

"Among inmimorable false, unmoved, 
Unshaken, uuscduced, unterrified, 
His loyalty lie kept, liis love, his zeal ; 
Nor number, nor example with him wrought 
To swerve from truth or change his constant mind, 
Though single." 

The most brilliant mental efforts of his life are not 
upon record. The sudden bursts of his often matchless 
eloquence have passed away with the time and occasion 
of their utterance. Those preserved of his addresses 
on different occasions are cold and formal, compared 
with others uttered without premeditation, when under 
the inspiration of the moment his mind glowed with the 
fire of genius and strength. His ease and grace of 
delivery, his felicity of expression, his wonderful flow of 
harmonious language, the musical intonations of his voice, 
can never be forgotten by those who have heard him in 
many of his happy efforts. His eulogies upon Senator 
Broderick and Mr. Ferguson, a State senator of Cahfor- 
nia, are specimens of the highest oratorical pathos; while 
his oration in San Francisco upon celebrating the laying 
of the Atlantic cable, contains passages of the greatest 
sublimity and l^eauty. In my judgment, his impromptu 
reply to Senator Breckinridge, during our session in July, 

lir & 



44 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

was his ablest in the Senate. But the genial nature, the 
eloquent tongue, the mind which reveled in its own 
exuberant creations, now sleeps in those cerements 
which at last embrace with their chill folds all the 
children of men. 

Mr. President, let us not mourn the death of our com- 
panion. With my estimate of his character, it was a 
noble conclusion to an almost romantic history. As we 
are told 

" The paths of glory lead but to the grave," 
why regret the certain end, when the feet of the noble 
dead have trod all the flowery ways of enthusiasm, elo- 
quence, and patriotism ? Colonel EmvER was ambitious, 
he died a Senator; he was eloquent — he held a Senate 
captive and heard the plaudits of an admiring people ; 
he was patriotic — he could do no more than sacrifice 
his life upon the altar of his country amid the shock of 
Ijattle, and leading tiie van. The measure of human aims 
with him was complete. Half a, century of winters had 
scattered their snows upon his head — public judgment 
had awarded him a place among the most eloquent, and 
thus honored and beloved he has filled his destiny. 

Our people on the far off Pacific will gather around 
his bier and by silent tears testify not his but their own 
loss and affliction. 

The restless waves of a great ocean will moan for ages 
to come beside his grave, and his honored ashes lie in 
the peaceful shadow of the Lone Mountain, that natural 
monument for the loved and lost of our new empire. 



The resolutions were adopted unanimously, and the 
Senate adjourned. 



■m 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 45 



IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. 
Friday, January 22, 1862. 



DEATH OF SENATOR BAKER. 

A MESSAGE from the Senate, by Mr. Hickey, its 
chief clerk, communicated to the House resolutions 
passed by the Senate on the occasion of the announce- 
ment of the death of Hon. Edward D. Baker, late a 
Senator from the State of Oregon. 

The message from the Senate was read, as follows: 

In Senate of the United States, 

Decanhcr 11, 1861. 

Resolved, unanimously. That the members of the Senate, from a 
sincere desu-c of showing every mark of respect due to the memory 
of Hon. Edavard D. Baker, deceased, late a Senator from the 
State of Oregon, will go into mourning by wearing crape on the 
left arm for thirty days. 

Resolved, unanimously, That, as an additional mark of respect 
for the memory of Hon. Edward D. Baker, the Senate do now 
adjourn. 

Resolved, That the Secretary of the Senate communicate these 
resolutions to the House of Representatives. 



@ — m 



u ■ :f 

46 OBITUAEY ADDRESSES- 



Acldress of Mr. Sheil, of Oregon. 

If the message just read lias not startled us from our 
usual decorum by announcing an unexpected calamity, 
its effect is not the less painful, since it awakens 
memories of a rooted sorrow. 

Colonel E. D. Baker is dead. He fell at the head of 

his column, while bravely, gallantly engaging the enemy 

at BaU's Bluff, in the State of Virginia, on the 21st of 

last October. His fellow officers and men bear honor- 

a1)le and gratifying testimony of his daring courage in 

that his first engagement during the present war. Such 

courage as he there displayed has commanded the 

universal admiration of all times; and so ennobling is 

this enthusiasm for the truly brave, that w^e can confess 

to be hero worshippers without being guilty of idolatry. 

In the personal history of the deceased, there is a 

lesson well calculated to inspire hope and stimulate 

ambition for worthy purposes in the youth of our coming 

generations. No pampered ease or "castle of indolence" 

was his by virtue of his birthright. The solemn but 

merciful decree passed upon "man's first disobedience" — 

that in the siveat of thy face shalt thou eat bread — 

promised him no royal road to this world's honors. 

Yet there was no sinking of the heart, no relaxing of 

the muscles, nor pahng of the cheek, when he went 

forth as a volunteer to the great and most merciless 

of aU l^attle-fields — the world. Years rolled on, and 

manhood found him still in the field, but without 

promotion. 



At this period his mind must have been improved l)y 
refining and elevating studies, or some new impulse 
must have awakened an ambition that at no time pre- 
vious seemed to have engaged his thoughts or influenced 
his actions; for thenceforth he evidently determined to 
seek glory by the mind, rather than by bodily strength. 
His repeated triumphs, and the many honors fairly won 
in his new field of labor, fully justified him in his high 
resolve. 

A youth when landing upon our shores, without 
friends, fortune, or even what is considered an education, 
before he reached the meridian of life he was honored 
with the credentials of a Senator in the Senate of the 
United States by the legislature of the State of Oregon — 
the highest honor that a sovereign State of this Union 
can confer upon her citizens. 

Those of us who have been so fortunate as to have 
heard Colonel Baker in his forensic efforts l^efore the 
people, or on the floor of tliis House or of the Senate, 
cannot easily let slip the silver thread of memory that 
renews our pleasures by reviving such delightful remi- 
niscences. True, he had not the statesmanlike gravity 
and ponderous utterance of a Webster, nor the oratorical 
elegance of a Clay, nor the stern and unanswerable logic 
of a Calhoun; but he had a mind stored with the richest 
treasures of English literature; a fluency as inexhausti- 
ble as a well of living waters ; a vivid imatjination, thoui»h 
never violating the rules of correct taste ; a memory that 
had complete control over the storehouse of his knowl- 
edge; and a delivery apparently unstudied, and yet so 
graceful, that gave to his elocpience a power which, if it 
did not always convince, it was always certain to please. 



'#■ 



^ _ rj^ 

48 OBITUARY AI>])RESSES. 

Oil the successful completion, as it was believed for 
a short time, of the submarine telegraph between the 
United States and Great Britain, our citizens, from one 
end of the land to the other, manifested their delight 
by speeches, processions, and other public demonstra- 
tions, for what they regarded as the greatest achievement 
of modern science. The citizens of San Francisco 
celebrated the event with becoming ceremony. They 
selected Colonel Baker as orator for the occasion ; and 
fully did his peerless effort justify their choice. He 
saw^ not "as in a glass, darkly," but by the clear light of 
intelligent calculation, that while one end of the line 
might be in London, the other must ultimately be on 
the shores of the Pacific. And thus the ties of home, 
and kindred, and friends, and the bonds of interest were 
no longer to be loosened by time, nor weakened by 
distance. To the citizens of that Ultima Thule of the 
Republic such a picture of such a future, though drawn 
by an inferior hand, would appeal with thrilling effect. 
But while the original enterprise failed — an enter- 
prise so grand in its conception, so benefiicent in its 
anticipated results — its extension across the continent is 
a successtully established fact. Yet while we rejoice in 
this noble proof of American enterprise, the melancholy 
reflection will be ever associated with these incidents, 
that among the first telegrams sent over this same line 
to the Pacific, there was one that announced the death in 
battle of the gifted orator. 

The remarks which I have just made have been 
necessarily very brief My limited acquaintance with 
Colonel Baker, owing to the shortness of his residence 
in Oregon, as well as a wide divergence in our political 



m- 



q 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 49 

views and faith, prevent me from detailing more par- 
ticularly the traits of his character, as also the distin- 
guished achievements of his military prowess. Aware 
that there are others who will fully and more ably supply 
my deficiency, I feel less apprehension than I otherwise 
should. 

As the representative of the State of Oregon, duty, 
consecrated by an impulse that finds a home in every 
generous heart, demands this offering to the memory of 
the deceased. 

But, sir, there is something more than a sense of 
duty that prompts me to take part in this solemn cere- 
mony. I would do injustice to my feelings if I refused, 
on such an occasion as the present, to pay my humble 
tribute to the memory of a gallant officer and an eloquent 
Senator. 

I offer the following resolutions: 

Resolved, That the House of Representatives of the United 
States has received with the deepest sensibility the intelligence of 
the death of Hon. E. D. Baker. 

Resolved, That the members and officers of the House of Rep- 
resentatives Avill wear the usual badge of mourning for thirty days, 
as a testimony of the profound respect that the House entertains for 
the memory of the deceased. 

Resolved, That the proceedings of this House in relation to the 
death of Hon. E. D. Baker be communicated to the family of the 
deceased by the Clerk. 

Resolved, That, as a further mark of respect to the memory of 
the deceased, this House do now adjourn. 



le M 



p ■ m 

50 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



Address of Mr. Phelps, of CaUfornia. 

Mr. Speaker: In sorrowfulness of spirit, such as 
I have seldom felt, I rise to second the resolutions 
proposed by the honorable member from Oregon. 

As a friend and admirer of the deceased Senator, and 
as a representative of California, I should be doing 
injustice alike to my own feelings and to the feelings of 
those who have honored me with a seat upon this floor, 
did I allow the opportunity to pass without adding my 
tribute, however humble, to his memory and worth. 

This, Mr. Speaker, is a time in our history tliat tries 
the materials of which men are made. It may have 
been difficult heretofore, but now the chaff is easily 
separated from the wheat — the base metal from the 
gold. Perhaps no higher eulogy could be passed upon 
the lamented Senator than to say, no man who knew 
Edward Dickinson Baker ever doubted his loyalty 
and devotion to the Federal Government. When this 
rebellion burst upon the country, enveloping it in darkness 
black as night, — when no friendly star penetrated the 
gloom — when a large portion of our people had forgotten 
the struggles and teachings of our fathers, and the beauties 
and blessings of our liberal institutions, and had allowed 
their hearts to become alienated from the Government, 
until they found themselves arrayed in arms against and 
endeavoring to overthrow it, and a greater number still 
were apathetic — when the very pillars were crumbling, 
and the foundation stones were settling away, threaten- 
ing a total destruction of the whole structure, — it was 
not doubted where Colonel Baker would be found. All 

g) g 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 51 

knew that his eloquent voice would be heard defending 
the Constitution and Government; that he would speak 
such words of encouragement and hope as would energize 
the timid and the weak, and that his arm would be 
reached out to protect and to defend. 

Oh ! that all of his associates in the Senate had been 
like him ! Then the earth would not have been con- 
vulsed by the mighty throes of this great Republic; 
then the nation would not have bled from every pore, as 
she now Ijleeds. He was always ready to defend the 
honor of the Government, whether upon the stump, in 
the National Councils, or in the tented field. His great 
heart was so wedded to it that it had not a pulsation 
Ijut what was devotional, and could not, by any possi- 
bility, have been swerved from its loyalty. Like the 
old cannon at Sumter, which, though it had been used 
perhaps a hundred times to thunder forth salvos in honor 
of the stars and stripes when proudly and defiantly 
unfurled to the breeze, yet when used to salute it on 
being hauled down, after capitulation to a treasonable 
foe, burst into fragments; so would the heart of Colonel 
Baker, ere it could have been turned from its allegiance 
to a government that had so long received its warmest 
pulsations and truest devotion. 

It was a matter of congratulation with all loyal men 
in California — and, thank Heaven! the great mass of 
the people there are as loyal, and true, as any who 
breathe the inspiring air of liberty — that the country 
had Colonel Baker in its chief council, in the place of 
one who had forgotten alike his duty to his government^ 
and the binding force of his oath of office to support 
the Constitution. California never regarded him as 

y m 



belonging particularly to Oregon, but as well to herself, 
and tlie whole country. Besides, as he was long a citizen 
there, she claims, by having given him prominence, no 
small share of the credit of his having been placed in 
the Senate. 

It should be remarked that this loyal defender of the 
Government, to whom so many thousands looked for 
counsel and direction when that Government was attacked 
by this giant rebellion, this bold and daring warrior 
chieftain, whose fiery words of stirring eloquence, assisted 
so much in fanning into a flame the slumbering embers 
of patriotism in the bosoms of our people, was not a 
native of the country. Yet how many of our citizens, 
who are natives of the soil, and inherit the blood of 
revolutionary sires, might learn a lesson of duty and 
patriotism from him. The loyalty of Baker, Sigcl, 
Corcoran, and their brave countrymen, demonstrates the 
wisdom of our fathers in inviting them to our shores, 
and extending to them all the benefits of our republican 
institutions. They had struggled for years through 
difficulties that would have appalled a less brave and 
indomitable people, to gain the independence of the 
country, and which, being established, they magnani- 
mously tendered to the oppressed of every land a home, 
and full participation in, and enjoyment of, its liberal pro- 
visions. In doing this, our fathers truly cast their bread 
upon the waters, which, after many days, has returned 
to aid us with the assistance of this class of our fellow- 
citizens, who are to-day gallantly bearing arms in defense 
of the government, and among the leaders of whom 
Baker, Sigel, and Corcoran have been prominent. 

It is no wonder that the leaders of the traitors, whose 

jg: ^3 



m m 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 53 

headquarters are at Richmond, should desire to hmit 
the right of the elective franchise, and to change our 
naturalization laws, as our foreign-born citizens furnish 
the poorest material out of which to manufacture traitors, 
for the reason that many of them have tasted of tyranny 
in the Old World, and have no longing for it here. 
General Baker was born in the city of London, in the 
year 1811. In 1815 his father, Edward Baker, removed 
with his family to this country, settling in the city of 
Philadelphia, where they resided for about ten years. 
In 1825 he removed his family to Illinois, where the 
early manhood of Edward Dickinson Baker was spent, 
and where his remarkable mind ripened into full power 
and elegance. Young Baker studied law in the office 
of Judge Caverly, at Carrolton, at which place he mar- 
ried a lady of high character and position, who still 
survives him. In 1835 he removed to Springfield, 
Illinois. In 1837 he was elected to the legislature of 
that State, and re-elected soon thereafter. He served 
from 1840 to 1844 in the State Senate. In 1844 he 
was elected to a seat in this branch of the National 
Legislature, serving with distinction until the breaking 
out of the difficulties with Mexico, when he proceeded 
to Springfield, and raised a regiment of young men, who 
were immediately accepted by the Government, and 
embarked for the war. 

On arriving at Matamoros, irregularities were discov- 
ered that demanded immediate attention, and Colonel 
Baker came to Washington as bearer of dispatches. 
AVhen he arrived here Congress was in session, and 
avaihng himself of his right to a seat, he pleaded the 
cause of the volunteers, then in the field, in a speech of 

m 



n 

54 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

great force and power. His mission to Washington 
accomplislied, he resigned his seat in the House, and 
returned to his regiment in time to share in the siege 
of Vera Cruz, and served with distinction during the re- 
mainder of the war. After its close, he was again elected 
to a seat in this House, and served his term with great in- 
dustry and success. His eulogy, pronounced during that 
term, upon the death of President Taylor, is one of the 
gems that ornament the proceedings of Congress. In 
1852 he went to California, establishing himself in the city 
of San Francisco, where he practised his profession with 
success, notwithstanding he took strong grounds against 
certain popular movements, which would have destroyed 
the popularity of any other man. J3ut Colonel Baker 
could not be unpopular, as his eloquence always charmed, 
though it did not always convince the multitude. 

It was my good fortune to become acquainted with 
him soon after his arrival in San Francisco. That 
acquaintance soon ripened into friendship, and a friendly 
intercourse existed between us until his death. 

On his advent into California, he found a political 
despotism reigning there, as corrupt, as it was intolerant, 
which had well-nigh crushed out the last relic of political 
freedom, and the last hope of freemen. This state of 
things was sufficient to enlist his earnest attention, and 
he finally yielded his determination to eschew politics 
altogether, to the clamors of those desiring reform in 
the city and State governments, who thought his popu- 
larity would secure his election, and his ability enable 
him to effect the desired reformation, and became a 
candidate for the State senate in 1855. I was among 
those selected on the legislative ticket with him; but 

m — — m 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 55 

tliougli a stirring canvass was made, we suffered a 
Waterloo defeat. This, however, instead of dishearten- 
ing, only aroused his energies and fixed his determination. 
In 1856 he entered the field for Fremont, and, though 
there was no hope of carrying California, made a brilliant 
canvass of the State. During this campaign, it frequently 
happened that no person of his political sentiments could 
be found to introduce him to his audiences, when he 
would either introduce himself, or some person noto- 
riously opposed to his principles, would volunteer to 
render him that service. But notwithstandinof so few 
at this time agreed with him politically, so great was his 
reputation as an orator, he could always command larger 
audiences than perhaps any other man in the State; and 
though he suffered defeat after defeat, in successive 
campaigns, he never relaxed his energies, his hold upon 
the public mind, or his determination to see the com- 
plete triumph of freedom of speech in California. He 
knew that intolerance could not last always, and that 
reformation, justice, and freedom of speech and of the 
press, must finally prevail. 

After struggling along from year to year until his 
object was nearly an accomplished fact, or at least until 
the dawn of a new era was faintly preceptible, he went 
in 1859 to Oregon, where he entered immediately the 
political arena, and after a brilliant campaign was 
elected to the Senate. From this period his acts are so 
intimately blended with the history of the country, and 
are so well understood, I need not advert to them. To 
his unyielding determination, coupled with his undying 
love for free institutions, his glowing eloquence and 
unanswerable logic, is California indebted, more than to 

13 



any other man, for the entire overthrow of the pohtical 
despotism that so long held her in its traitorous grasp. 
And the whole country is also indebted to him in no 
small degree, that California is to-day in the Union l)y 
her own act and choice, and as true and loyal as any 
State over which the banner of freedom waves. 

Years ago, when our present dithculties were only 
foreseen by the wise and cautious, and scarcely believed 
to be of probable occurrence by them, Baker was 
engaged in moulding public sentiment, and inculcating 
something like a proper respect for the sacred right of 
freedom of speech upon all questions of public policy. 

The oligarchy that ruled the State as with a rod of. 
iron, claiming to represent it here and elsewhere, but 
who outraged every sentiment of the great mass of the 
people, and betrayed every trust confided to them, saw, 
doubtless, that he was dangerous to the existence of their 
power; but they could not reach hin in any way. He 
gave them no cause of attack; cool, courteous, and affa- 
ble, he would meet them with weapons they knew not 
how to use — logic, eloquence, and moral heroism. They 
were even forced to applaud his eloquence, which seemed 
to thrill and charm all who sat beneatli it; but his clear 
logic they would seek to bury lieneath their subtle sophis- 
tries, or dispel its force by mere denunciation. 

Perhaps the most saddening event that befell Colonel 
Baker in California was the death of his friend — the 
determined, true, loyal, gallant, lion-hearted Senator 
Broderick. They had just been through a campaign 
together, armed only with truth and justice; and followed 
by an undisciplined train of supporters, having had to meet 
an organization that had always held despotic sway, they 

IQI . ^ 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 57 

were, as might have been expected, unsuccessful While 
their hearts were still sore at the want of success of their 
cherished principles, Broderick fell a victim to that code, 
unjust as it is cruel and barbarous, that, in some sections 
of the country, still disgraces alike humanity and the age 
in which we live. The whole State was sensibly affected 
by the death of one they had looked upon as a cham- 
pion, as true to his principles as the needle to the north 
pole. Thousands, even among those who had always 
opposed him politically, as they gazed upon his inani- 
mate form, paid the tribute of tears to the fallen hero. 
Colonel Baker, by general consent, became the funeral 
orator, and in words of pathetic eloquence did justice to 
the memory of one so daring, so noble, and so true. 
But where will the orator be found in California, or here, 
who will be able to do justice to the memory of the self- 
sacrificing, patriotic, and gallant Colonel Baker ? 

As a noticeable incident, I may be permitted to remark, 
that some years ago, when it was supposed that a strong 
and durable cable had been laid through the Atlantic, 
that would thereafter pulsate with thought between the 
great hearts of the Old and Nev^ World, the people of 
the metropolis of the Pacific duly celebrated the event. 
Always enterprising and enthusiastic, the citizens turned 
out in vast numbers; and Colonel Baker, being one who 
could always meet the expectations of the people, was 
chosen to deliver an address on the occasion, and acquit- 
ted himself with great credit. All those who had the 
pleasure of listening to him on that occasion pronounced 
his efibrt one of the most chaste and elegant discourses 
to which they had ever listened. Years of busy tumult 
had rolled their round, when certain energetic persons 



S- 



determined upon the construction of a trans-continental 
telegraph hue, that should unite the far-off shores of the 
Pacific with the Atlantic sea-board. In due time the 
great work was commenced, and the people watched its 
progress with much interest, until finally they were told 
that on the morrow it would be completed, and they 
brought within instant communication with their old 
homes; when, though separated by mountain chains, 
valleys, and wide-spreading deserts, husbands and fathers 
could converse, by the aid of the electric current, with 
wives and children, from whom they had been separated 
for years, as though they again surrounded the family 
hearth. That morrow came, and the citizens of San 
Francisco had prepared to celebrate that event, also, with 
fitting demonstrations of joy. The wires were at last 
joined together. Distance had been overcome. The 
stormy Atlantic and the peaceful Pacific, separated since 
the beginning of time, if not now united, were at least 
brought within speaking distance of each other. But 
all rejoicing was soon terminated. The first message 
that flashed from east to west over the wires announced 
the death of Colonel Baker. Quick almost as the elec- 
tric flash that conveyed the message there, did the cur- 
rent of sorrow run through the city. Joy faded from 
the faces of the multitude. The crowded streets were 
hushed into silence; and in place of loud rejoicing came 
the whispered accents of mourning. All who loved the 
Union and the old flag, felt that one of the most eloquent 
defenders of the former had fallen heroically defending 
the latter. All agreed a great man had passed away. 
Thousands mourned in him the loss of a true and gener- 
ous friend. All mourned for the great orator whose 



lb:- 



silvery voice they had so often heard as it stole out in 
harmonious cadences upon the evening air, on occasions 
well remembered, when his eloquence had seemed to 
lift them above the conflicting elements of the world 
into a sphere of poetry and thought which his genius had 
created. A great party mourned the loss of an intrepid 
leader, who had done so much to call it into existence in 
that State, and cause it to become the ruling power. 
They felt that, to use his own words, pronounced upon 
the death of the lamented Broderick, "as in hfe no other 
voice among us so rang its trumpet blast upon the ear 
of freemen, so in death its echoes will reverberate amidst 
our mountains and our valleys, until truth and valor cease 
to appeal to the human heart." 

And there were others there whose sorrow could only 
be comforted by the hand of the Almighty Father who 
had called the valiant hero home. A loving, trustino- 
wife was apprised by that despatch that she was thence- 
forth a widow, and daughters were informed that a kind 
and indulgent father had died " doing duty." I would 
not disturb the sublimity of their sorrow, or quietude of 
their woe; and yet, I would assure them that a grateful 
country will hold in sacred remembrance those who fall 
in defense of our great inheritance — the Constitution 
and the Union. To the sorrow-stricken wqdow and 
children I would say, weep not, grieve not; it is glorious 
to die in defense of one's country, in the performance of 
the highest earthly duty; and dying thus, to the patriot 
death is robbed of its sting. 

Could I speak to-day to Washington and his com- 
patriots, who struggled so long to establish this Govern- 
ment for us, and to Baker, Lyon, and Ellsworth, and 

m ' m 



their brave comrades who have fallen in its defense, I 
would acknowledge to the former that we have sinned 
deeply ; that the Government which they established has 
taken to its bosom many vipers, who, after being w^armed 
into strength and power, have stung it until every 
artery has flowed with a green, corrupting, and poisonous 
current ; l)ut I would assure them that it is recovering 
from it; and that we see cheering evidences that it will 
soon be restored to full health, strength, and vigor in all its 
parts, without undergoing the amputation of any member 
of its great body; and the latter I would assure, that the 
great cause for which they risked and sacrificed their lives 
is constantly progressing, and that the armed hosts mar- 
shaled in defense of the Constitution will onward, and 
onward, and onward move, until every armed foe is driven 
from the limits of the country, and every rebel footprint 
is obliterated from our soil. To accomplish this, let tlie 
loyal people emuhite the self-abnegating example of the 
brave Colonel Baker. Let our Army strike quick, and 
hard, and home upon the enemy, and treason will melt 
and flee away. Follow his example, 

"And the star-spangled banner in triumpli shall wave 
O'er the laud of the free, and the home of the brave." 

in every State and Territory, that has ever acknowledged 
its sway. 

The remains of the late Senator have been removed 
fo-r burial to my far-off" home of the West, where the 
waves of the mild Pacific gently lave the golden sands 
from the Sierra's slopes. 

"Good friend! true hero!" to your memory hail: to 
the kind face, the genial companion, the manly form, 
farewell! 



-JBl 



Address of Mr. Colfax, of Indiana. 

Mr. Speaker: The funeral procession of the departed 
Baker has passed through the crowded streets of our 
Atlantic cities. The steamer, perhaps to-day, is bearing 
its precious burden between the portals of the Golden 
Gate. The thousands who, with enthusiastic acclaim, 
cheered his departure as a Senator, stand, with bowed 
frames, and bared heads, and weeping eyes, to receive 
with honor, but with sorrow, the lifeless remains that 
are to be buried in their midst. And there devolves 
upon us, his former associates, brought by the telegraph 
almost to the side of his open grave, the duty of render- 
ing also our tribute of affection to his memory. 

To say that the deceased Senator was an extraordi- 
nary man, is simply to reiterate what the whole country 
long since conceded. He carved out his own niche in 
the temple of fame. He built his own pedestal in our 
American Valhalla. And if the French philosopher 
D'Alembert was correct in saying that there are but 
three ways of rising in the world — to soar, to crawl, and 
to climb — our friend's history is a striking exemplifica- 
tion of the last and worthiest of these ways. The hand- 
loom weaver boy of Philadelphia — the friendless lad, with 
his whole fortune in a meager bundle, turning his face 
westward — the patient journey, footsore and weary, over 
mountains and valleys — the deputy in the clerk's office 
at Carrolton, patiently mastering the principles of the 
law — his rapid rise in his profession — his election to 
Congress from the capital of Illinois — his volunteering 
in the Mexican war, and raising, equipping, and march- 
ing his regiment within fourteen days — his brilliant 



y- 



m m 

62 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

cliarge at Ccrrb Gordo, when following up the victory 
which his impetuous and dashing heroism had mainly 
won, he pursued the enemy for miles with fearful 
slaughter — his removal, on his return, to another con- 
gressional district, which he carried by his wonderful 
eloquence against its previous political convictions — his 
removal to California — his thrilling oration over the 
murdered Broderick — his triumphant canvass in Ore- 
gon — his election to the Senate by a legislature, a large 
majority of which differed with him in their political 
associations — his brilliant and impromptu denunciations 
of traitors, whom, in the Senate Chamber, he propheti- 
cally hurled from the Tarpeian rock — his exchanging 
the robe of the Senator for the sword of the Soldier — 
his daring struggle to wrest victory, against overwhelm- 
ing odds, from fate itself — and his death at the head of 
his column, literally with his back to the field and his 
face to the foe — what an eventful life, to be crowned 
by such a glorious death. 

We know not but that death may have been as wel- 
come to him as life, especially when he fell in such a 
sacred cause. Some long for death on the battle-field, 
knowing that it is appointed for all men once to die, and 
that he who dies for his country is enshrined forever in 
thousands upon thousands of patriot hearts. Others 
who, if we could put a window in their breasts, we 
would find that they carried a burden of care or sorrow 
through life, feel that the shaft of death, when sped by 
its messenger, would have no pain for them. And with 
others, life is so joyous that the hour of their departure 
is one of gloom, and thick darkness encompasses the 
valley their feet must tread. But for our friend, who 



-a) 



■M 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 63 

had won liis way to his highest ambition, and who fell, 
in the very zenith of his fame, in defense of the Consti- 
tution and the Union, charging at the head of advancing 
columns, careless of danger, of odds, or of death, leaving 
behind him a glory which shall survive long after his 
tombstone has molded into dust — we should rather weave 
for him a garland of joy than a chaplet of sorrow. 

I know there was sadness in the family, which no 
earthly sympathy can assuage. I know there was sad- 
ness at the White House, where his early friends 
mourned their irreparable loss. I know there was sad- 
ness at the Capitol; sadness on the Atlantic coast; 
sadness in the valley of the Mississippi; sadness as one 
of the first messages flashed along the wire he had so 
earnestly longed to see stretched from ocean to ocean, 
boi'e to the Pacific the tidings of their great loss. There 
was sadness around the camp-fires of over a half-million 
gallant volunteers, who, like him, had offered their lives 
to their country in its hour of trial. So, too, if the legends 
of antiquity intend to commemorate some patriotic sacri- 
fice of life by the story of Curtius leaping into an open 
gulf to save the Roman repul^lic, was there sorrow doubt- 
less at his fate. And sadness, too, when Leonidas, at 
the head of his feeble band, looked death calmly in the 
face, and gave up his narrow span of earthly life to live 
immortalized in history. 

But, though there may be sadness such as this, let us 
also rejoice that our friend has left behind him such a 
record and such a fame, heightened by his magical elo- 
quence, and hallowed forever by his fervid patriotism. 
For, doubly crowned, as Statesman and as Warrior, 

"From the top of fome's ladder he stepped to the sky." 



ah 



p ^ ^ -. ^ 

64 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



Address of Mr. Dunlap, of Kentuchij. 

Mr. Speaker: Edward D. Baker was an Englishman 
born; yet as an adopted American citizen, a tribute to 
his memory even by one far removed from the scenes of 
his active hfe, will not be deemed obtrusive, for his was 
a national character. His infancy was cradled on the 
bosom of the ocean, his manhood careered in the storms 
of war, his penetrating mind discerned his fatal fall, and 
he now sleeps in a warrior's grave. Bold and fearless, 
his eloquent voice was lately heard in the councils of the 
nation, in withering denunciations of treason, and his last 
vital action was a patriot's martyrdom. Conspicuous 
in all his movements, he was the marked object of his 
opponents, and the fatal field in mute silence enshrouds 
his form. Poverty was his inheritance, civil and military 
pre-eminence, his testamentary bequest. Reared by no 
bountiful hand, his early days spent in a city life of un- 
envied toil, he brooked the frowns of penury and want, 
and on the sunset side of the Alleghanies, in the bound- 
less prairies of the West, he sought a home of future 
usefulness. Proud of his profession, he rivaled the 
nation's Douglas. His ambition was of no ordinary 
mould; stimulated by the surroundings of his adopted 
home, just bursting the bands of primeval beauty, and 
gradually emerging into national usefulness, his new-made 
friends appreciated his energy of character, and tendered 
him legislative preferment. 

Civil honors awaited him, and with almost matchless 
eloquence his advocacy of the Mexican war, gave him an 
elevated position in this new theater, and won for him 
the name of Orator. His patriotic devotion was not 

m. • ■ 'k 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 65 

surpassed by the native-born citizen. Guided by that 
love that masters the soul, in the hour of peril, he gave 
up the emoluments and trappings of civil office, and 
sought the tented field. Upon Cerro Gordo's heights, 
he aided in planting the banner of the American Union, 
which, in his fall, became his winding sheet. Upon the 
restoration of peace, his restless and ambitious spirit 
sought other chmes, and California, with her gilded 
beauty, became the spot of the patriot's care, where 
clustered for a time the joys of home, and the rich re- 
ward for eminent services was a people's devotion. He 
v.as generous, brave, and manly, winning favor by his 
mildness of character, yet decisive action. In political 
or legal conflicts he dealt his blows with artistic skill. 
As a commander in the field or leader in party contests, 
he stood pre-eminent for his firmness, bravery, and gal- 
lantry. Possessing a mind l^old in conception, grand in 
design, and powerful in execution, he was fitted for every 
crisis that marked the eventful age in which his brilliant 
career shone forth so conspicuously. Indomitable energy 
and burning zeal for his country, were characteristics that 
stamped his every action. With no model, he was the 
architect of his own fortunes. His persuasive manner 
captivated his hearers in debate, and his true nobleness 
of character won for him a myriad of friends. Separated 
from the social ties, which linked his temporary destiny, 
with all that could stimulate a generous heart, he cast his 
eye upon the EMPIRE CITY OF THE WESTERN 
OCEAN, with recollections of sweet endearment, and 
bid it farewell for the spot that last honored him with 
civil promotion. Infant Oregon found in him a devotee 
to her flist-developing resources, and a confiding con- 



m n 

6G OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

stitucncy trusted the gifted stranger with her fortunes and 
her tate. He was to speak for her in the national Capitol. 
True as she was to that Union, which constituted the 
elevated aim of his highest, his proudest aspirations, he 
won for her an enviable position. A nation's peril led 
him to the field; and, like the gallant Lyon, he sought 
death rather than defeat. 

That a deep sorrow pervades the heart of the Ameri- 
can people, at the loss of a man so energetic, firm, and 
true to her interests in this trying struggle for a nation's 
integrity, none will gainsay; yet with that feeling there 
is mingled an exultant pride, that he, the distinguished 
dead, was one of us. He emphatically belonged to the 
people. From their ranks he sprung; for their advance- 
ment and prosperity he labored; for their approval he 
toiled; for the perpetuity of their honor he died. How 
commendable such a death ! to leave a name enshrined 
in the heart of this great nation. He felt a firm convic- 
tion that he would fall a martyr in stemming the culmi- 
nation of this wide-spread treason; but nothing daunted, 
with heart of fire and brow of steel, he unbosomed his 
front to the torrent that overwhelmed his gallant form. 
Naught but the frame of such a spirit can ever die. The 
spirit will live, to animate all patriots. Ball's Bluff, in all 
rt'corded time, will proclaim his martyrdom. "The din 
of battle and clash of arms" awake not the sleeping dead. 
Oregon raises the wail of woe, State after State joins in 
the sad chorus, and the private circle wears a melancholy 
cast. Edward D. Baker is gone, and, in his eloquent 
and touching language at the grave of Broderick, let us 
for him exclaim: "Good friend, true hero, hail! and 
farewell." 

p 



Address of Me. Richardson, of Illinois. 

Mr. Speaker: I am sure the House will indulge me 
while I add a few words in reference to the illustrious 
dead. I first met Colonel Baker, sir, in 1832, upon the 
northwestern frontier of the State of Illinois. We were 
soldiers in the ranks in different commands. At the close 
of that campaign we returned and lived in adjoining 
counties. We met frequently at the bar. We were 
members together of the House of Representatives of 
that State in 1837. We served two years in the Senate 
of that State together. During the war with Mexico 
he commanded a regiment; I was a subordinate officer 
of another regiment during the same period. We served 
together during one Congress in this Hall. I have known 
him well. It has been my fortune, in all the various re- 
lations where we have met, to encounter him in debate. 
We belonged to different and opposing political parties; 
and at the bar, in both branches of the legislature, l^efore 
popular assemblies, in this House, I never came from a 
contest with him the victor. I have met but few men 
in public life, sir, who were more brilliant as oratoi's 
than Colonel Baker, and he added to it high scholastic 
attainments. But, sir, it would be drawing an imperfect 
sketch of his character if we only gave him these attri- 
butes. While his mind "possessed the brilliancy of the 
diamond, it had its solidity, too." 

Before popular assemblies his brilliancy of display 
attracted and commanded the admiration of his audience. 
It was for the adversarv to discover that in these con- 



-m 



m 9 

G^ OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

Iroversies there was more than the flowers of rhetoric. 
I have met but few men in pul)Kc hfe whom I regarded 
as so dangerous an adversary in a pohtical contest as 
Colonel Baker few wlio had deeper convictions than he 
had. I might refer to numerous instances of the depth of 
his convictions, but one will be sufficient. When, at the 
grave of his friend, the late Senator fi-om California, Mr. 
Brodcrick, to which the Representative from California 
[Mr. Phelps] has referred, Colonel Baker denounced 
the practice of dueling as inhuman and barbarous, he 
uttered no new sentiment of his. In 1850, during a 
memorable occasion here, a collision was about to occur 
between Colonel Bissell, of Illinois, and Jeffersou Davis. 
In a casual conversation which I had with Colonel Baker 
and some others of our then colleagues, he denounced the 
practice of dueling as imfamous, barbarous, and inhuman. 
It struck us all with a good deal of astonishment, show- 
ing that we had had but an imperfect knowledge of his 
character. Brave, daring, gallant, as we knew him to he, 
we thought he would interpose no objection to the fight. 
We combatted his arguments as best we could ; but they 
left on each of us a deep impression. But for that con- 
versation, no adjustment of the difficulty would have been 
made. Having returned to the Hall of the House of 
Representatives, General Dawson, then a Senator from 
the State of Georgia, came to my seat and expressed a 
desire to speak with me in the rotunda. I went there 
with him. He said, "We can settle this thing." I 
agreed to try with him to settle it. But for the con- 
versation which had taken place a few moments before 
in which Colonel Baker had taken such a conspicuous 
part, I should have rejected the proposition at once. I 



m s 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 69 

will not relate the whole history fof that transaction, but 
will only say that it was adjusted without dishonor to 
Colonel Bissell. 

Mr. Speaker, Colonel Baker has fulfilled the prophetic 
words which he uttered on this floor in 1850. He said, 
at the conclusion of one of his speeches, 

"I have only to say that if the time shoukl come when disunion 
rules the hour and discord is to reign supreme, I shall again be ready 
to give the best blood in my veins to my country's cause. I shall 
be prepared to meet all antagonists with lance in rest, to do battle in 
every land in defense of the Constitution of the country which 1 have 
sworn to support, to the last extremity, against disunionists and all 
its enemies, whether of the South or North ; to meet them every- 
where, at all times, with speech or hand, with word or blow, until 
thought and being shall be mine no longer." 

He has fulfilled the prophecy. 

The people of Illinois felt as deep anguish in the 
death of Colonel Baker as did the people on the distant 
shores of the Pacific, or as any people in this nation. 
He was bound to them by many ties. His mother re- 
sides among them. His brother and sister are there. 
His early manhood's struggles and triumphs were there. 
He led her sons in the hour of battle to victory. They 
honored him by conferring on him places in the legis- 
lature and in Congress, and he reflected honor on them 
by the brilliancy of intellect which he brought to the 
discharge of his duties. 

Death has been busy with that bright array of intellect 
which shone so brightly in the State of lUinois in our 
times. We have mourned at the graves of Harden, and 
Ford, and Harris, and Bissell, and our cherished leader, 
Douglas; and now we mourn at the grave of Baker. 
The gems have dropped away from that circle. Some 



LQ; 




of its brightest stars have been stricken out and obscured. 
A few years must sweep away from existence those who 
have been the rivals and compeers of the illustrious dead; 
and, sir, if the survivors can bring a nation sorrowing 
around their graves as have done those who have gone 
before them to the tomb, we shall have cause to rejoice 
in them. 

I can say, from my knoMdedge of Colonel Baker, that 
he was the manly and courteous opponent, the unselfish 
friend, the statesman without reproach, the brilliant 
orator, the gallant soldier. In obedience to his orders, 
in compliance with his duties, at the head of his com- 
mand, standing beneath the flag, in support of the Con- 
stitution of the country, he has fallen, and gone to his 
rest forever. He has faithfully discharged his duties to 
his country and to mankind. 



Address of Me. Saegent, of California. 

Mr. Speakee: With unaflTected sadness I rise to add 
a few words of tribute to the memory of my deceased 
friend, although little remains to be said by way of 
biography, or even of eulogy. I speak with intimate 
knowledge of the man from long association socially 
and politically — from a sympathy with his principles and 
active cooperation with him in many of his undertakings. 
Tame and dull seem any words of eulogy applied to that 
splendid intellect, that valorous heart, unless they could 



■m 



HON. EDWAliD D. BAKEK. 71 

be conceived in his own brain of fire, and uttered by his 
affluent tongue. But 

"His signal deeds and prowess high 
Demand no pompons enlogy — 

Ye saw his deeds! 
Why should their praise in verse he snng? 
The name that dwells on every tongue 

No minstrel needs!" 

His faults, which were few, were those of the generous 
and social; his virtues were many and heroic. Deeply 
ingrained in his nature was a love of freedom; a rever- 
ence for free institutions, free labor, free men; a pleasure 
in the elevation of the masses that no demaii:oorue can 
appreciate. Hence, his noblest efforts of oratory and 
richest gems of thought are found in those orations 
where he appealed directly to his people to be true to 
the principles of American liberty, and reminded them 
of the privileges of freemen. Hear hhii, after the goal 
of his ambition was w^on, the highest position his birth 
enabled him to fill, as he gives the key-note of his whole 
political life. He said, at San Francisco, when on his 
way to take his seat in the United States Senate, 

"As for me, I dare not, will not, be false to freedom. Where the 
feet of my youth were planted, there, by freedom, my feet shall ever 
stand. I will walk beneath her banner; I will glory in her strength. 
1 have watched her in history struck down on a hundred chosen fields 
of battle. I have seen her friends fly from her ; her foes gather 
around her. I have seen her bound to the stake ; I have seen them 
give her ashes to the winds. But when they turned to exult, I have 
seen her again meet them face to face, resplendent, in complete steel, 
brandishing in her strong right hand a>flaming sword, red with insuf- 
ferable light. I take courage. The people gather around her. The 
genius of America will at last lead her sons to freedom." 



■m- 



Seizing upon the Republican party, in 1856, as the ex- 
ponent of these his cherished convictions, in advance of 
nearly all other leaders, he traversed our hills and valleys 
and talked to the miners and farmers of the dignity of 
that free labor by which they had created a State, and 
magically illustrated the great issues of that contest. 
His prophetic mind, even at that early period, looked 
forward to the troubles with which we now contend. 
He appreciated the baleful effects that would be pro- 
duced by the advancing, aggressive slave power of this 
nation, even to the destruction of the Union and Consti- 
tution; for he was learned in the hearts of men, and his 
penetrating mind had not been deceived l)y the specious 
pretenses of the men who even then cloaked treason 
with a fair exterior. Therefore he sought to prepare 
the minds of the people for effectual resistance to its 
usurpations. He was in advance of the age in that 
remote State; but such labors could not fail of effect. 
Those who have heard in the other Chamber his nol)lc 
defense of the integrity of this Union against its assail- 
ants, who have seen his logical sword piercing to the 
dividing of the joints and marrow of the controversy, 
have an idea of the keenness of his intellect and the 
felicity of his language. But his electric power over the 
masses was yet superior to any force he wielded in such 
debates. He appealed to their better natures in behalf 
of their best interests, and he aroused them to tumultuous 
enthusiasm, or subdued them to tears, at his will. I do 
but strict justice to his memory when I say that Califor- 
nia is largely indebted to Edward D. Baker that she 
is not to-day within the grasp of secessionists, and that 
she is represented no longer in this Hall by politicians of 



-m 



■m 



HON. ED WARD D. BAKER. 73 

the Calhoun school, l^iit by men charged to declare her 
unalterable fidelity to the Union. 

Colonel Baker was eminently a leader of public senti- 
ment. With his gallant and daring nature he would 
never follow, would not timorously feel after puldic opin- 
ion. He Vv'as always in the van. Therefore, he never 
asked if a measure was popular as a condition of his 
support; he only cared if it w^as right. No matter how 
great might be the public opposition to any measure he 
deemed just and beneficial, he was not deterred from its 
support, but only labored harder to secure its success. 
Relying upon his great powers of intellect, the influence 
his unrivaled oratory enabled him to exert over his fel- 
lows, he dashed against popular opposition, and frequently 
turned it back where other men would have been trampled 
under foot. He had a faculty of identifying himself with 
his audiences, expressing their thoughts, leading their 
sympathies, speaking from their level with mingled sim- 
plicity and dignity, that dissolved prejudice and captivated 
their hearts. Possessed of enormous power for good or 
evil, the admiration that follows his memory is mingled 
with love and gratitude that he devoted his rare gifts to 
the good of humanity and to the noblest patriotism. 

His original and fearless mind could be but little 
controlled by party ties. He looked through party to 
principles. His spirit was eminently cathohc. He 
gladly welcomed co-laborers, coming from whatever 
source, and gave his services to elevate his nominal op- 
ponents. Calling himself a Republican, and sincerely 
such in principle, he was anxious to unite all who agreed 
in essentials. He set the example, in his political action 
and speeches, of discarding prejudices and minor distinc- 



m.- 



-IB) 



m- 



74 



OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



tions from that true policy wliicli best serves and advances 
vital interests. Hence he disregarded party names, to 
fight by the side of his friend Broderick, when that 
noble Senator returned to California, after his first ses- 
sion, with the thunders of the Administration leveled at 
his head, for his opposition to its corruptions and to the 
extension of slavery. And when Mr. Broderick fell, a 
martyr to his devotion to human liberty. Colonel Bakers 
oration over his body, in the hearing of weeping thon- 
sauds, in the public square in San Francisco, had the 
intensity of grief of that of Marc Antony over the body 
of Caesar: 

"My heart is in the coffin there, with Ccesar, 
And I must paiise till it come back to me." 

And there is a passage in that noble oration almost 
foreign to the gentle nature of the late Senator, as he 
spoke of the patient grief of the people, who hung upon 
his words, over their inestimable loss, that recalls the 
bitterness of those other w^ords of the Roman orator — 

"But were I Brutus, 
And Brutus Antony, there were an Antony 
Would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue 
In every wound of Caesar, that should move 
The stones of Rome to rise in mutiny!" 

Was not the great champion of liberty slain? The 
labor of years destroyed in an hour? The first victory 
of freedom turned to bloody disaster? What wonder 
that, mingled with his eloquent sorrow, were thoughts 
of that vengeance that strikes hke the thunderbolts of 
fate. Heart-broken he turned from the scene, and his 
eloquent voice was heard no more in our State until the 



m- ^ 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 75 

blood of Broderick had been best avenged by the triumph 
of the principles for which he was slain. 

Honored by a seat in the national Senate by our sister 
State of the Pacific, a position which we of California 
w^ould gladly have conferred upon him if we had had the 
power, and which he valued as the most dignified and 
honorable that could be bestowed, with true patriotism 
and noble gallantry he laid his position, his fortune, and 
his life upon the altar of his adopted country, and fell, 
as a patriot warrior should, contending against its foes. 
It is true, that he fell in an objectless fight; that no 
commensurate result followed the great sacrifice; but not 
the less noble the patriotism that animated him. Where 
shall we look in the annals of this or any war for a more 
heroic display of sublime courage than was exhibited on 
the disastrous day that witnessed his death, as he moved 
from rank to rank of his feeble command, encouraging 
his comrades by cheerful words, calmly directing their 
efibrts, sharing their toil and utmost danger, his majestic 
form the mark of every hostile bullet, yet disdaining 
precaution, the gallant leader of a forlorn hope, with 
death alike in front and rear, entrapped into a position 
where victory and retreat were alike impossible, and 
surrender worse than death ? With the immediate cause 
of his sacrifice, with that fatal and ill-advised movement 
at Ball's Bluif, I do not intend to deal. I doubt not the 
disasters of that day have impressed their lesson where 
it was needed, and there I am content at present to leave 
them. Pity it is, that that lesson has cost us so dear. 

With the many elements of the sublime in his nature, 
he was eminently kind and friendly. His disposition was 
social, his heart open and cheerful as the day. He was 



— . m 

7G OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



approachable to the huml}lest, sincere in his friendships, 
mindful of favors, hberal in retnrn. No enemy could 
provoke him to hatred, no ally complain of treachery. 
He was indebted as much to the sincerity of his nature, 
which was manifest in every word and act, as to his 
wonderful powers of oratory, for the ascendency he 
secured wherever he sought it. Prejudice melted in the 
sunlight of his smile. As imagination followed his bold 
flights through poetic realms, or reason labored to master 
his rapid deductions, his audiences would sway with 
admiration; and then, changing to deepest pathos — a 
pathos beyond affectation — that could spring only from 
a heart in sympathy with all that is good and gentle and 
true, he would move his listeners to tenderness and trust, 
opening his heart of hearts to their gaze, and captivating 
their aflfections by a glance into the riches of a nature so 
sympathetic that he bound them to his cause by very love 
of its advocate. 

Mr. Speaker, we of Cahfornia have not to-day the 
privilege of remembering the dead Senator as honored 
by us with his seat in the highest council of the nation. 
We have not the grateful recollection that the honor 
which he shed upon the Pacific States by his brief but 
splencUd career in the Senate, is the peculiar treasure of 
our State. But California will ever claim and cherish 
the memory of Edward D. Baker as one of her brightest 
jewels. Our State was the object of his earnest love — 
the theater of many of his highest achievements. He 
was familiar with our skies and mountains, our streams 
and forests, our cities and homes. He loved our people, 
and they loved him with fervent idolatry. Their hearts 
bled in ansfuish when the liCThtnin«^ flashed the dismal 



m- 



HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 77 

intelligence of his untimely fate; and even now his ashes 
are borne over the waves to rest in the soil he loved, by 
the side of that other slain Senator, in the shadow of the 
Lone Mountain. In his own magnificent phrase, "As in 
life, no other voice among us so rang its trumpet blast 
upon the ear of freemen, so in death its echoes will re- 
verberate amidst our mountains and our valleys until truth 
and valor cease to appeal to the human heart." I but in- 
adequately speak the emotions of the people of my State, 
as I seek in feeble words to do honor to his memory. I 
would this triljute were worthier, that I could hans: ^ 
garland upon his tomb worthy of his illustrious shade. 

But the future will be just to his fame. When history 
makes record of the heroic deeds done in this holy war, 
the name of Edward D. Baker will inspire to subiimest 
praise, and his memory be preserved from age to age like 
the sacred fire upon Vesta's altar. For myself I desire 
no higher motive for my public acts than inspired his 
glorious patriotism, his undying love of freedom. And, 
sir, I trust that the declaration of his truthful lips, made 
a little over one year ago, and which I shall quote — a 
declaration maile in bitter mortification, in contemplation 
of the spectacle we presented to the civilized world, may 
have lost its truth and meaning by means of the national 
regeneration this war is producing : 

"Here, [said lie] in a laud of wi-ittcu constitutional liberty, it is 
reserved for us to teach the world that under the American stars and 
stripes, slavery marches in solemn procession ; that under the Ameri- 
can flag, slavery is protected to the utmost verge of acquired territory; 
that under the American banner, the name of freedom is to be faintly 
heard, the songs of freedom faintly sung ; that while Garibaldi, 
Victor Emanuel, every great and good man in the world, strives, 
struggles, fights, prays, suffers, and dies, sometimes on the scaffold, 



^ ;a] 

78 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 



sometimes in the {limgeon, often on the field of battle, rendered im- 
mortal by bis blood and liis valor ; tliat wliile this triumpbal proces- 
sion marches on through the arches of freedom, Ave, in this land of 
all the world, shrink back trembling when fi-eedom is but mentioned." 

Sir, the spell is broken. We dare to be free. The 
traditions of our race sadly teach that freedom is only 
bought with blood ; and noble blood has been shed to 
emancipate us from the domination of that despotism 
which has fettered liberty and corrupted conscience. It 
seems a fearful price to pay when our Lyons and Bakers, 
our Winthrops and Ellsworths, are cut down in the glory 
of useful manhood. • But the nation is being educated in 
heroism, and we are giving to the future holy names, and 
memories, and examples — inestimable gifts that will l)e 
cherished by our children's children as their richest 
inheritance. 



Address of Mr. Kelley, of Pennsylvania. 

Mr. Speaker: My personal acquaintance with Senator 
Baker was of recent date. It commenced about the 
time of the inauguration of President Lincoln. But 
under the influence of his graceful and genial manners 
and confiding nature, it soon ripened into mutual friend- 
ship, attested, on his part, by acts gratefully received and 
now sacredly remembered by a number of my young 
constituents, who desired to prove their patriotism by 
following him when he should lead a column 'mid the 
"sheeted fire and flame" of some second Cerro Gordo. 

m- ^ — — ^y 



fB) ^ 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 79 

He was a fascinating companion; and I knew not 
which most to admire, the heartiness, ease, and grace of 
his social intercourse, or his power as a thinker, orator, 
and leader of men. Who that has seen his eye flash as 
his voice swaj'ed the Senate or the assembled multitude 
of eager listeners, shall forget its firet Or who, that has 
heard him quietly relate some mirth-moving incident, 
will forget the genial light with which it illuminated his 
sweet smile I Alas ! that it should have closed in death 
while the blood of vigorous manhood poured from his 
many wounds. 

But, Mr. Speaker, sorrow as we may with those whom 
he so tenderly loved; grieve as we may for our country, 
to whose welfare and glory his life was so unsparingly 
devoted, let us not mourn his death, for in it a well- spent 
life was fitly rounded. The enduring monuments of a 
nation are the stories of its men, which, if these were 
truly great, illuminate the future while they exemplify 
the past; and when Edward Dickinson Baker died, 
another name was indelibly graven on the imperishable 
rolls of American orators, statesmen, and soldiers. 

He was not a native of the city which I have the honor, 
in part, to represent The people of Philadelphia knew 
that he was born in England; that he came to manhood 
ill Illinois, and, as a colonel from that State, bore the 
unsullied flag of our country from Vera Cruz to the city 
of Mexico; that it was as a citizen of distant California 
he had thrilled the heart of a great and wide-s])read 
people by the utterance of his indignant sorrow over the 
body of the murdered Broderick; and that it was as 
Senator from more distant Oregon he had hurled from 
the "Tarpeian rock" the Cain-like son of Kentucky, 

't i 



who, impelled by ambition lawless as that of Lucifer, 
prated of the sanctity of the Constitution, that, by the 
arts of Judas, he might betray a confiding people; yet 
they loved him as one of themselves. 

His early youth was passed in Philadelphia. Many 
of his relatives still reside there; and he always loved 
the city in which his father — yet kindly remembered Ijy 
many — essayed to maintain his family by the labors of a 
teacher, and in which he first felt the quenchless flame of 
honorable ambition; and, after having publicly dedicated 
himself "to fight for country, home, law, Government, 
Constitution, right, freedom, and humanity," he came 
thither to enlist a regiment, to follow him to victory or 
the grave, in so grand a cause. He came to raise one 
thousand men. The announcement of his name and 
purpose was magical as the summons of Roderick Dhu. 
More offered than could ])e accepted. 

"From the gray sire, wliose trembling hand 
Could hardly buckle on his brand, 
To the raw boy, whose shaft and bow 
Were yet scarce terror to the croAV ; 
Till at the rendezvous they stood 
By hundreds, prompt for blows and blood." 

And when his so-called California regiment left its 
place of rendezvous, it embraced three battalions and 
mustered over fourteen hundred of the flower and pride 
of Philadelphia. The day on which they passed through 
our city to encamp in a neighboring park was a gala day. 
I saw them as they moved along one of our principal 
thoroughfares; the music to which they marched was 
the plaudits of dear kindred, friends, and neighbors. It 
was a goodly sight to look upon, lieside the acute 

ig m 



^ p 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 81 

lawyer, experienced legislator, glowing orator, and tried 
soldier, Colonel Baker — whose name the fondest and 
proudest hopes of the city garlanded — rode the brave 
and accomplished young Quaker, Wistar, upon whom, 
with the afiection of a father, he relied with such well- 
placed confidence as his "good right arm." And in the 
column that followed was as grand an embodiment of 
character, culture, courage, and loyalty as ever regimental 
officer commanded. No holiday or hireling soldiers were 
they; but men with tender ties, bright prospects, and 
noble aspirations — men who knew what peace and free- 
dom are, and how worthless life would be without them. 
How dauntless was their courage, how perfect their 
devotion to chief and cause, Massachusetts and New 
York will tell when they write the story of their sons 
whose conduct on that ill-chosen field invests with a 
radiant halo the doubts and disasters of Ball's Bluff. 

When his regiment had been in the field a short time, 
the Government offered Colonel Baker a general's com- 
mission, which he refused to receive ; but while he grace- 
fully declined the rank and pay, he accepted the labors 
and responsibilities of the station. About that time the 
business of recruiting seemed to flag, and with charac- 
teristic energy he undertook the labor of enlisting the 
additional regiments required to complete his brigade. 
Again he came to Philadelphia. Colonels Baxter, Owens, 
and Moorhead having served three months, and been 
honorably mustered out of service, had each gathered 
about him the nucleus of a regiment for the war. He 
saw and conferred with them. Moorhead had known 
him, as youth knows a gallant leader, "when pursuing 
honor on the distant fields of Mexico." Baxter, one of 

i; u 



_ -dj 

82 OBITUARY ADDRESSES. 

their number, was appealing to our firemen to encounter 
on a new field the toil and danger with which their 
unrequited labors make them so familiar; and in Owen 
he found an intelligent and educated representative of 
the courage and enthusiasm of the Irish -American 
people. He authorized them to announce their regi- 
ments as part of his brigade, and thus again disclosed 
the magical power of his name; for however tardily 
recruiting had gone on before, men now rallied around 
the standard of these officers more rapidly than the 
Government could arm and equip them; and in a few 
days an exultant people cheered the departure of the 
last of them for the embattled field. 

The qualities which gave Colonel Baker so controlling 
an influence among men seem to me to have been his 
frankness, his fidelity, and that great-hearted humanity 
which interested him in whatever concerned the rights, 
comfort, or welfare of those about him. In him my 
young townsmen declare they found not only the soldier's 
first need — discipline and guidance — but also a patient 
listener, wise counselor, and sympathetic friend. 

His career illustrates the beneficence of our institu- 
tions. Neither, the poverty of his childhood, nor the 
fact of his foreign birth, depressed him. And as his 
restless energy bore him westward from the Atlantic 
even to the Pacific coast, he found under the Constitu- 
tion of our country legitimate scope for all his activities. 
It is not generally known that with his varied powers he 
also possessed a fine poetic gift. It was, however, well 
known to his intimate friends; and I have sometimes 
thouorht that, thoudi under other Governments or in 
other times he might not have been known as an orator. 



-m 



statesman, or soldier, he would still have achieved lasting 
fame. The man who could close the rhythmical expression 
of an exquisite fancy with the exclamation — 

"It were vain to ask as tliou rollest afar, 
Of banner or mariner, ship or star; 
It were vain to seek in tliy stormy face 
Some tale of the sorrowful past to trace. 
Thou art swelling high, thou art flashing free, 
How vain are the questions we ask of thee! 

"I too am a wave on a stormy sea; 
I too am a wanderer, driven like thee; 
I too am seeking a distant land 
To be lost and gone ere I reach the strand; 
For the land I seek is a waveless shore, 
And they who once reach it shall wander no more." 

The man, I say, who, with Colonel Baker's love of 
right and large human sympathy, could give such ex- 
pression to his fancy, might not have attained political 
power under institutions affording less scope to his 
activity, Init would probably have shone in literature, 
and enrolled his name with those of Korner, Schiller, 
and Burns. 

Mr. Speaker, our sympathy will not reanimate the 
moldering remains of our departed friend; but we can 
see to it that the people realize the hope in which he 
rejoiced : " That the l)anner of our country may advance, 
and wheresoever that banner waves, there glory may 
pursue and freedom be established." 



Address of Mr. Kiddle, of Ohio. 

Mr. Speaker: The nation mourns her dead, not as in 
the peace-time, when one of her kiiiglj ones went from 
a rounded and perfect career, leaving our sky brightened 
with his passage, and ghttering with the new stars his 
hand had set in it. Then indeed she mourned, but it 
was with a proud and satisfied sorrow, as she inurned 
his ashes in her bosom and transferred his glory to 
her diadem, brighter for the tears with which she em- 
balmed it. Now, we feel as if a strong and beautiful 
column had been shattered in our midst ere it was finished, 
and leaving a temple tottering for its support. It is as 
if we had suddenly stumbled upon the corpse of the 
dead Senator, not composed in the dignity of calm death, 
with his robes about him, but mangled upon a rent field, 
with the cloud of battle on his brow, and its flash still 
flickering in his eye; with his battle blade shivered in 
his hand, and the nation's ensign torn from its staff, 
scorched and crimsoned and trampled into the red earth 
beneath him. This is the picture that starts fresli and 
ghastly before us, and we contemplate it with pallid sur- 
prise, with the gush of first grief, and with a fierce indig- 
nation, for we know the hand that robbed us of this rea^al 
form and royal soul. And as we contemplate it, other 
forms marred by the hand of this war come in mourning 
procession and range themselves about this grand figure. 

There is the shadowed face of Ellsworth, whose winged 
spirit bore him a step beyond frigid duty to a murderer ; 
yet that spot is a shrine, and the dark edifice that holds 
it is chipped away for memorials and amulets and talis- 
mans. We now know the meaning of that nameless 



ia 



m -— 

HON. EDWARD D. BAKER. 85 

shadow that deepened his boyish beauty. And Win- 
throp, radiant in young genius, with his hilt wreathed 
with the offerings of poesy and romance, rushing as 
bhthely to battle and to death as a young bridegroom to 
the couch of expectant love. 

And Lyon, from the far-off Missouri, who hurled his 
four or five regiments into the battle-embrace of twenty 
thousand enemies, and grasped victory out of the iron 
fangs of fate, and relinquished it only to the hand of 
death. 

They throng about us, pale and shadowy, from scores 
of fields of g'Ory and disaster. 

Hundreds of our broad-browed, open-eyed youths — 
without a taint in their blood or a stain on their souls 
pure as the mothers who bore them, and beautiful as the 
sisters in their homes — have been lost in fierce conflict, 
where individuahty is dropped, melted out in the fiery 
mass of molten valor that roars and swells and breaks in 
red waves ; when wounds do not smart, and death does 
not sting. Many — oh ! how many — in rude, dilapidated 
hospitals and chilly tents, untended and uncared for, 
have passed away, solaced only by fever-dreams of far-off 
homes, bringing the images of cool hands and loved forms 
they shall meet never, save in the "silent land." 

These were not enough! A higher sacrifice; the 
highest the land could offer — he whom the Constitution, 
written by our fathers, made the peer of the President ; 
and whom the constitution, written by the finger of God, 
made the peer of the proudest, living or dead — was de- 
manded. And there, in that narrow, fire-girt field, at the 
close of that shortened autumn day, under that gray, piti- 
less sky, amid defeat, disaster, and death, that sacrifice 



■m 



was made. It was perfect. The sky circled no nobler 
victim. That man-form was swayed by the brain of a 
statesman, and garnered the wisdom of a sage. It was 
warmed by the heart of a hero, and held the arm of a 
warrior. In it burned the imagination of a poet, and its 
utterances were with the tongue of an orator ; and over 
aU reigned a soul angelic in its elevation. 

The nation mourns her dead; and when, in the anguish 
of this great loss, we contemplate the measureless 
calamity of which it is a part, and see the springs and 
causes and the hands that worked this dire woe, demands 
for an almost religious vengeance struggle for place and 
expression in our grief We feel as if we should summon 
hither our young legions, and bidding them dip their 
weapons in this sacred blood, we should hurl them on 
the guilty land, to drive the plowshare of utter destruc- 
tion through a soil that reeks with the feculence and 
slaver of all crime. That we should here invoke that 
the red-visaged angel of retributive wrath be loosened 
and sent to hover on the pinions of fright and terror 
over that doomed clime, and distil images of dire horror 
among the ghastly, shivering, guilty wretches below. 
Pardon me if such emotions should find no utterance 
here where everything should be softened and elevated 
to the tender grand sorrow of a great nation in the 
presence of a great grief 

Mr. Speaker, what fruition is to spring from all this 
wide, wild waste and desolation? AVhat great fitting 
conclusion is to leap or grow from this crushing of the 
caskets of so many priceless lives t Are all these sacri- 
fices to be in vain ? or may we gather from them inspira- 
tion and courage and strength and stature, to confront and 



U- 



grapple witli the event that so overshadows and dwarfs 
ns all? or shall they, furnishing the only light on the 
darkest page of American history, be transmitted for 
the benefit of a better generation, to whom that page 
shall tell the story of our visitation, and our opportunity, 
of the means before us and our weakly turning from 
them? That instead of our springing into the propor- 
tions of giants, and doing giants' work, we dwindled and 
driveled and shriveled and shrunk, and were buried 
under a burden that we could not carry. 

This crowning loss shall be all a loss, if, like blinded 
men in darkened rooms, we waste our strength and energy 
in buffeting shadows and phantoms and shams that mock 
us as we smite. Not in vain, if, with the one great object 
we go confidently forth into the field of God's providence, 
and in the clear, white light, read the inscription em- 
blazoned on the front of this huge treason, and apprehend 
the lesson it teaches. There, too, we shall find an ample 
means and a golden opportunity, like severe-browed yet 
staying angels, awaiting our footsteps. 

A nation mourns her dead, and questions while she 
mourns. 

Mr. Speaker, it was not needed that I should add a 
single leaf to the rich and varied garlands scattered with 
the profuse hand of national and individual grief upon 
the resting-place of the dead Senator. I had no ambition 
to bring a wrought wreath ; I only wished to lay upon or 
near it one little broken spray. 



The question was taken, and the resolutions were 
adopted. 

g 50) 



\ 



-BIVlr'07 



^ 



